- Pronouns
- He
[X] Chaparral Arrow IV artillery (faster, less damage)
AoE, yes please
[X] Field guns (long-range, mostly stationary)
AoE, yes please
[X] Field guns (long-range, mostly stationary)
-
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Battletech: Mercenaries (G2)
- Thread starter NickAragua
- Start date
- Sci-Fi Action
Chirapare Objective Raid - Week 1.2 (May 6, 3054)
- Location
- New England
Vote Results:
Wolf opts for a Long Tom artillery piece and some crew-served gauss rifles. Theoretically, the guerillas will show up about a minute after we start shooting, with some tanks.
We'll see how that goes.
Round 1:
The Long Tom gives a solid boom to start things off. But Wolf and the rest of the lance don't wait. There are two central buildings that, if leveled, will prevent the rest of the facility from functioning, so we simply go in and blow them away.
Wolf and TheMix begin working on the bigger structure, causing the segment (and turret on top) to collapse, while Backwash and 9B hits the second one with a PPC and LRM salvo.
Wolf swats aside a Zephyr as it blasts some armor plating off the Hellbringer, flipping the hovertank over. A hovercraft that 9B's computer identifies as an "Asshur" opens up on the gauss rifle crew, spoiling their aim and hitting a few of the armored troopers, but 9B puts a stop to any further activity of that sort pretty quickly by stepping on it.
Round 2:
The first Long Tom round lands more or less right on target, completely collapsing the larger of the structures. With 9B and the gauss rifle infantry set to finish off the last structure, Wolf, TheMix and Backwash begin to back off.
The clan units start pursuing, but their lead Demon tank is disassembled by Wolf's methodical PPC fire, while Backwash disables a pursuing Asshur with a PPC shot to its left flank - the blue lightning penetrates the side armor and the electrical feedback shuts down the vehicle's motive systems.
Round 3:
9B sends a few more LRMs into the facility, pinging a Demon tank and blowing one of its wheels off, and then we're off the field, the Long Tom ceasing fire and disengaging. By the time any response force shows up, we'll be long gone.
The remaining tanks are somewhat reluctant to pursue us. The guerillas have once again failed to show up in time for the fight. Go figure.
No matter - we've taken out all the designated targets on this landmass, and it's time for us to move on. The main decision to make here is whether to wait the three days for everything we have to come back to the landing zone then sub-orbital hop the dropships together, or send the Moonraker ahead to do some aggressive recon.
The latter will let us get started on taking out targets in our second assigned area quicker so that we can be done with this contract quicker and run less risk of a "proper" clan response. We've been here for a little over a week - so there wasn't a quick reaction force standing by just waiting for us. We also haven't seen any signs of jumpships arriving at the local jump points and the time to transit from standard point to planet is ~4 days - this means that we'll have that much warning time (unless they decide to use a pirate point).
The downside of that approach is that the local forces may catch on to what we're doing and try to intercept our non-lead dropship or hit one or both of the landing zones while the dropships aren't grouped together.
[] Wait ~3 days, move everyone together
[] Move smaller force to next area immediately
Long Tom - almost unanimous
Field Guns - almost unanimous
Field Guns - almost unanimous
Wolf opts for a Long Tom artillery piece and some crew-served gauss rifles. Theoretically, the guerillas will show up about a minute after we start shooting, with some tanks.
We'll see how that goes.
Round 1:
Wolf and TheMix begin working on the bigger structure, causing the segment (and turret on top) to collapse, while Backwash and 9B hits the second one with a PPC and LRM salvo.
Wolf swats aside a Zephyr as it blasts some armor plating off the Hellbringer, flipping the hovertank over. A hovercraft that 9B's computer identifies as an "Asshur" opens up on the gauss rifle crew, spoiling their aim and hitting a few of the armored troopers, but 9B puts a stop to any further activity of that sort pretty quickly by stepping on it.
Round 2:
The clan units start pursuing, but their lead Demon tank is disassembled by Wolf's methodical PPC fire, while Backwash disables a pursuing Asshur with a PPC shot to its left flank - the blue lightning penetrates the side armor and the electrical feedback shuts down the vehicle's motive systems.
Round 3:
The remaining tanks are somewhat reluctant to pursue us. The guerillas have once again failed to show up in time for the fight. Go figure.
No matter - we've taken out all the designated targets on this landmass, and it's time for us to move on. The main decision to make here is whether to wait the three days for everything we have to come back to the landing zone then sub-orbital hop the dropships together, or send the Moonraker ahead to do some aggressive recon.
The latter will let us get started on taking out targets in our second assigned area quicker so that we can be done with this contract quicker and run less risk of a "proper" clan response. We've been here for a little over a week - so there wasn't a quick reaction force standing by just waiting for us. We also haven't seen any signs of jumpships arriving at the local jump points and the time to transit from standard point to planet is ~4 days - this means that we'll have that much warning time (unless they decide to use a pirate point).
The downside of that approach is that the local forces may catch on to what we're doing and try to intercept our non-lead dropship or hit one or both of the landing zones while the dropships aren't grouped together.
[] Wait ~3 days, move everyone together
[] Move smaller force to next area immediately
- Pronouns
- He
[X] Wait ~3 days, move everyone together
Now there's a name open for mockery.
- Location
- Tristania
[X] Wait ~3 days, move everyone together
Chirapare Objective Raid - Week 2 (May 9, 3054)
- Location
- New England
Vote Results:
May 9, 3054
"Is that an Overlord?" AWS asks as Delta lance trudges through the intense sandstorm. The weather has basically grounded all of our aircraft, starting up just a little bit after landing - but it's a great opportunity for our mechs to sneak around, get some sensor scans and establish a perimeter while hostile aerospace units and vehicles are hunkered down.
"Yeah." Freyland confirms. "Sensor signature is definitely Overlord. We don't know what's on it, and the storm is almost out. Back to base, everyone."
Delta lance has located two targets of interest - the Overlord and a communications hub. The latter should be taken out to hamper long-range comms in the area - without it, locations that we are hitting in the area will take longer to receive reinforcements. For example, from said Overlord. We don't know how many mechs it has on board, but chances are that those mechbays aren't empty.
Lich's Zeta Lance gets the job of taking out the comms hub. The lance consists of Lich/Timber Wolf, Stefan/Trebuchet, WestOrEast/Griffin, Bass/Stormcrow. Delta lance's scans indicate a star of heavy tanks (mostly Demons) and a light/medium mech star, along with some minimum-value stationary turrets. The structures look a little tougher than the ones we've been blowing up recently, so a "quick" hit and run may not be practical. But we'll see. For support, Lich has a Long Tom deploy some distance from the battlefield - while we're engaging the ground units, it can do some damage to the stationary structures and soften them up or destroy them.
WestOrEast turns up the Griffin's ECM, jamming outgoing comms. Kind of. It's a comms hub, so the action is more symbolic than anything else.
Round 1:
Stefan runs up into a cluster of dried-out trees, unleashing the Trebuchet's LRM racks on a Demon tank driving down the nearby road - almost all the missiles hit, blasting chunks off the heavy tank - basically every one of its right-side wheels cracks and is left behind on the road, leaving it tilted and stationary. A gauss slug flies over the Trebuchet, causing our mechwarrior to cringe slightly.
Lich follows suit, firing the Timber Wolf's lasers and LRMs at a more distant Demon. While fewer missiles hit, they're more effective individually, and the wheeled heavy tank embeds itself in a nearby building as it tries to avoid the barrage, becoming stuck entirely.
Round 2:
The first Long Tom round whooshes down, a massive explosion emerging from the comms hub complex.
"That was a little bigger than I thought it'd be." WestOrEast comments.
The reason for the bigger explosion is that the Long Tom round landed on top of an SRM Carrier and lit off the ammo.
The light star comes out to engage us - vintage Star League mechs, including a Hussar, a Talon and an Ostscout. The Hussar takes some laser fire, its armor evaporating under the onslaught (not that there was much to begin with), then some LRMs fly in from Stefan's Trebuchet, popping a foot actuator . The mech stumbles, going down to a reverse-jointed knee.
Bass takes a couple of laser hits, but the Stormcrow's armor holds up.
Round 3:
The guy in the Hussar gets up and runs off - even with a damaged foot actuator, if a Hussar wants to leave, it will leave. Not much we can do to stop it. By the time it gets back with reinforcements, we'll be gone.
A Demon tank rolls out in front of Stefan, eating multiple lasers from our Trebuchet - this one's armor actually works, however. Furthermore, a gauss slug spangs off the Trebuchet's left torso, but the impact is at an oblique angle and the slug fails to penetrate.
The Talon and Ostscout sneak around WestOrEast's mech, opening up with lasers and scoring multiple hits, the Griffin warning the mechwarrior about a rear armor breach. Bass moves to cover the Griffin, engaging the Talon with lasers and causing a right torso armor breach.
Round 4:
Lich and Stefan split off, heading north into the complex - Lich wanting to take out the Kintaro lurking in there. The Ostscout pursues, avoiding most of our laser fire.
Bass and WestOrEast continue engaging the Talon, our Griffin scoring a head shot while our Stormcrow twists around and blasts the light mech's left arm. Unfortunately, it wasn't the PPC arm - but the damage distracts the clan mechwarrior long enough for WestOrEast to run in and crack its left leg, dropping it to the ground.
"Leave him, he's not going anywhere." Bass comments.
Round 5:
"Uh... maybe not the best idea." Stefan mutters as the Trebuchet's armor levels suddenly drop from green to yellow after the mech is worked over by multiple laser blasts and the heat levels shoot through the roof. Which isn't helped by the flamer turrets bathing our Trebuchet in sticky flammable gel.
He really just wanted to get some back shots on that Star League-era Crab, which he does, blue coolant fluid spraying out the back of the hostile mech. Lich's weapons fire mostly just melts armor from its front. At least the Crab winds up on the ground, where Stefan can deliver a kick to the downed mech's center of mass, shaking bits of gyro off the Trebuchet's foot as it withdraws.
Lich is targeted by the Kintaro, which, in turn is targeted by Bass - both mechs lose a little bit of armor.
Round 6:
As Stefan pulls back out of the facility, a Demon tank and Ostscout pursue him. "Don't worry, we got you." Bass calls out as him and WestOrEast move to help. The Ostscout zaps one of Stefan's lasers off, damaging the right shoulder actuator, while the Demon tank proves surprisingly nimble, avoiding all of WestOrEast's fire. Unfortunately, a heavy tank is not *that* nimble, so Bass lasers its right-side wheels off.
Lich grunts as multiple lasers from that surprisingly effective turret connect with the Timber Wolf's head.
The Crab pilot takes multiple tries to stand up, but eventually succeeds.
Round 7:
"When you three are done with that one Ostscout... " Lich calls out, pursued by the Crab and Kintaro while backing away from the laser turret. "... maybe someone can back me up here?"
The Crab slips on the pavement and falls, no doubt due to going a little too fast with a damaged gyro, while the Kintaro takes multiple laser blasts from the Timber Wolf. Lasers melt leg armor while the LRMs fly in - the 50-tonner's left leg takes a significant amount of damage, multiple actuators disappearing under missile fire.
The Crab and Kintaro return fire, but between having to take a knee and falling over, only one laser hits. Lich's mech also annoys him with multiple "NARC beacon attached" warnings. But there's not much to be done about it at this point.
Stefan takes a right torso armor breach, causing the Trebuchet to beep at him more than it was already.
Round 8:
Lich backs up to temporarily get out of the downed Crab's line of fire, opening up on the Kintaro as it gets up. One of the Timber Wolf's lasers connects with an ammo bin, shattering the mech. The LRMs fly through empty space. Return SRMs ping off the Timber Wolf's armor, but don't inflict much damage.
"Guess these rear line mechs don't have CASE, either." Lich comments.
WestOrEast finally gets a good bead on that obnoxious Ostscout - the Griffin's PPC flies wide, being an un-guided "slow" beam, but the lasers connect to devastating effect. One fries the left arm while the other severs the left leg, causing the 35-ton mech to flop to the ground, where missiles crack open its left torso.
Round 9:
"Artillery, cease fire. We'll handle the rest ourselves." Lich orders after a particularly poorly-aimed Long Tom round sprays the Timber Wolf with debris.
The rest of the fight is pretty uneventful - the Crab is unable to get up and the quad laser turret is removed by long-range LRM fire.
Damage to our units is minimal, although Lich got dinged a couple of times, and Stefan's mech will need a new arm.
"This is Mechwarrior Orran. It seems that you Inner Sphere surats have defeated me." the Crab's operator remarks over the open frequency. "Quite the feat of arms." Lich is pretty sure he detects sarcasm in that one. "But I have no desire to serve you as bondsman - I am too old and set in my ways, and you probably don't even know what a bondsman is. Grant me Hegira or Bondsref, or finish me."
Wolf's time in clan "captivity" has clued us in on what a bondsman is (kind of like a trial apprentice thing for "proper" mechwarriors), but Lich has no clue what those other terms mean.
[] "It would be a waste to kill you - come fight for us. On the next contract. You even get to keep your mech."
[] "Whatever, you can go."
[] "Fine, I'll finish you off."
Wait three days
May 9, 3054
"Is that an Overlord?" AWS asks as Delta lance trudges through the intense sandstorm. The weather has basically grounded all of our aircraft, starting up just a little bit after landing - but it's a great opportunity for our mechs to sneak around, get some sensor scans and establish a perimeter while hostile aerospace units and vehicles are hunkered down.
"Yeah." Freyland confirms. "Sensor signature is definitely Overlord. We don't know what's on it, and the storm is almost out. Back to base, everyone."
Delta lance has located two targets of interest - the Overlord and a communications hub. The latter should be taken out to hamper long-range comms in the area - without it, locations that we are hitting in the area will take longer to receive reinforcements. For example, from said Overlord. We don't know how many mechs it has on board, but chances are that those mechbays aren't empty.
Lich's Zeta Lance gets the job of taking out the comms hub. The lance consists of Lich/Timber Wolf, Stefan/Trebuchet, WestOrEast/Griffin, Bass/Stormcrow. Delta lance's scans indicate a star of heavy tanks (mostly Demons) and a light/medium mech star, along with some minimum-value stationary turrets. The structures look a little tougher than the ones we've been blowing up recently, so a "quick" hit and run may not be practical. But we'll see. For support, Lich has a Long Tom deploy some distance from the battlefield - while we're engaging the ground units, it can do some damage to the stationary structures and soften them up or destroy them.
WestOrEast turns up the Griffin's ECM, jamming outgoing comms. Kind of. It's a comms hub, so the action is more symbolic than anything else.
Round 1:
Lich follows suit, firing the Timber Wolf's lasers and LRMs at a more distant Demon. While fewer missiles hit, they're more effective individually, and the wheeled heavy tank embeds itself in a nearby building as it tries to avoid the barrage, becoming stuck entirely.
Round 2:
"That was a little bigger than I thought it'd be." WestOrEast comments.
The reason for the bigger explosion is that the Long Tom round landed on top of an SRM Carrier and lit off the ammo.
The light star comes out to engage us - vintage Star League mechs, including a Hussar, a Talon and an Ostscout. The Hussar takes some laser fire, its armor evaporating under the onslaught (not that there was much to begin with), then some LRMs fly in from Stefan's Trebuchet, popping a foot actuator . The mech stumbles, going down to a reverse-jointed knee.
Bass takes a couple of laser hits, but the Stormcrow's armor holds up.
Round 3:
A Demon tank rolls out in front of Stefan, eating multiple lasers from our Trebuchet - this one's armor actually works, however. Furthermore, a gauss slug spangs off the Trebuchet's left torso, but the impact is at an oblique angle and the slug fails to penetrate.
The Talon and Ostscout sneak around WestOrEast's mech, opening up with lasers and scoring multiple hits, the Griffin warning the mechwarrior about a rear armor breach. Bass moves to cover the Griffin, engaging the Talon with lasers and causing a right torso armor breach.
Round 4:
Bass and WestOrEast continue engaging the Talon, our Griffin scoring a head shot while our Stormcrow twists around and blasts the light mech's left arm. Unfortunately, it wasn't the PPC arm - but the damage distracts the clan mechwarrior long enough for WestOrEast to run in and crack its left leg, dropping it to the ground.
"Leave him, he's not going anywhere." Bass comments.
Round 5:
He really just wanted to get some back shots on that Star League-era Crab, which he does, blue coolant fluid spraying out the back of the hostile mech. Lich's weapons fire mostly just melts armor from its front. At least the Crab winds up on the ground, where Stefan can deliver a kick to the downed mech's center of mass, shaking bits of gyro off the Trebuchet's foot as it withdraws.
Lich is targeted by the Kintaro, which, in turn is targeted by Bass - both mechs lose a little bit of armor.
Round 6:
Lich grunts as multiple lasers from that surprisingly effective turret connect with the Timber Wolf's head.
The Crab pilot takes multiple tries to stand up, but eventually succeeds.
Round 7:
The Crab slips on the pavement and falls, no doubt due to going a little too fast with a damaged gyro, while the Kintaro takes multiple laser blasts from the Timber Wolf. Lasers melt leg armor while the LRMs fly in - the 50-tonner's left leg takes a significant amount of damage, multiple actuators disappearing under missile fire.
The Crab and Kintaro return fire, but between having to take a knee and falling over, only one laser hits. Lich's mech also annoys him with multiple "NARC beacon attached" warnings. But there's not much to be done about it at this point.
Stefan takes a right torso armor breach, causing the Trebuchet to beep at him more than it was already.
Round 8:
"Guess these rear line mechs don't have CASE, either." Lich comments.
WestOrEast finally gets a good bead on that obnoxious Ostscout - the Griffin's PPC flies wide, being an un-guided "slow" beam, but the lasers connect to devastating effect. One fries the left arm while the other severs the left leg, causing the 35-ton mech to flop to the ground, where missiles crack open its left torso.
Round 9:
The rest of the fight is pretty uneventful - the Crab is unable to get up and the quad laser turret is removed by long-range LRM fire.
Damage to our units is minimal, although Lich got dinged a couple of times, and Stefan's mech will need a new arm.
"This is Mechwarrior Orran. It seems that you Inner Sphere surats have defeated me." the Crab's operator remarks over the open frequency. "Quite the feat of arms." Lich is pretty sure he detects sarcasm in that one. "But I have no desire to serve you as bondsman - I am too old and set in my ways, and you probably don't even know what a bondsman is. Grant me Hegira or Bondsref, or finish me."
Wolf's time in clan "captivity" has clued us in on what a bondsman is (kind of like a trial apprentice thing for "proper" mechwarriors), but Lich has no clue what those other terms mean.
[] "It would be a waste to kill you - come fight for us. On the next contract. You even get to keep your mech."
[] "Whatever, you can go."
[] "Fine, I'll finish you off."
- Pronouns
- He
[X] "It would be a waste to kill you - come fight for us. On the next contract. You even get to keep your mech."
- Location
- Kansas
What's a Bondsref- is that like, a bondsmen referee or something?
- Location
- New England
You don't know in character, but it's basically ritual suicide (short for "bond refusal" or something like that) if you really don't want to become bondsman after getting your ass beat.
- Location
- Tristania
[X] "It would be a waste to kill you - come fight for us. On the next contract. You even get to keep your mech."
Chirapare Objective Raid - Week 2 (May 11, 3054)
- Location
- New England
Vote Results:
"Ok, I don't know what have of those words meant." Lich begins. "But it'd be a waste of a good mech... are you even listening to me?"
The Crab scrambles, attempting to get up, slips on the pavement and falls back down before finally managing to get up again, trying to book it to the north, wobbling around ("like a rookie after playing a round of jump-shot" is Lich's exact description), then falling over again. Lich watches with disbelief as the Crab pumps its legs, eventually finding enough purchase on the pavement to yet again try to get up, only to overcompensate and plow into a building. This time, it stops moving.
"You know what, maybe you don't get an offer of a spot in our company. You kind of suck." Lich concludes. "But we're keeping the mech. Salvage teams roll in, you have two hours. Two, Three, you're in charge of local security. Four, back to base with me, I've got a serious headache brewing. And what the hell happened to my leg? Ow."
The haul isn't too bad, although we designate most of it for our Draconis Combine employer. Our liaison informs us that he intends to use the DCMS share to supply the local guerillas. "Perhaps some of these faster units will enable them to show up to battles on time." he adds with a wry smirk. The Crab does have a bunch of double heat sinks we'll be able to pull out, as well as a pair of Star League tech extended-range lasers. Not quite the "front line clan equipment" we were hoping for.
Lich, is out of action for the rest of the month - somehow, our mechwarrior managed to break one of the bones in his leg (and get a concussion, but that'll clear up quicker than the leg will take to heal). Stefan's Trebuchet is going to be out of action as well for the rest of the contract, unless we can scrounge up parts to fix a 50-ton mech's endo-steel arm.
---
May 11, 3054
Caripare, Shared Clan Nova Cat/Smoke Jaguar Administrative Territory
Further recon patrols eventually locate another industrial target - a fairly substantial facility. One of our hovertank patrols tangles with a Nova Cat hovertank star, disabling four out of five and running the other one off; a second hovertank patrol of ours is completely eliminated by a star of light mechs. They do manage to take out a Mongoose via gyro hit while trying to get away. The third (short) hover lance gets through the hostile patrols and plots out a route to the target. They are run off by a star of light mechs, but are able to avoid that engagement.
Zenn7 takes the assault lance in, backed up by two squads of battle armor troopers. We've got Zenn7/Awesome, Siljanus/Mackie, Atrophy/Annihilator and CJ/Victor. The short hover lance is two Drillson hovertanks and a royal Zephyr. The battle armor is two squads of "standard IS battle armor". We'll see how they do.
There are many target structures (eleven), defended by a star of hovertanks, a star of heavy mechs (including a Hellbringer); the light mech lance is also returning from a patrol. On the plus side, the local guerilla forces have committed a heavy mech lance; and they're actually already there when we show up. Amazing.
One of the good parts is that we get our Waddles to sneak in and plant a bunch of landmines before the shooting starts. Not too many, but a good number.
Round 1:
Our hovertanks swing in to deliver lasers and SRMs (although not very many hit) to a 70-ton mech identified as a Grizzly. The SRMs ping off its armor with little effect, but enough that it is unable to score hits on our hovertanks.
CJ's target, a Zephyr hovertank, dances between the facility's buildings. CJ snaps a shot off from the Victor's gauss rifle, which somehow goes all the way through a building and out the other side, with enough force to blast off a drive fan and cause the hovertank to crash into said building.
Zenn7 and Siljanus inundate a Flashman with PPC fire, but the 75-ton heavy mech's thick armor holds up.
Atrophy doesn't have line of sight on any of this, so the Annihilator just pumps four slug rounds into one of the target buildings, gouging out huge chunks of the structure.
Round 2:
"Support-One here, my lift fans are chewing dust. Bailing out." comes the report from one of our Drillsons. A couple of the light mechs that had chased them off earlier are still in the area and one, a Talon with a clan-spec PPC, fries multiple components on the hovertank.
"Showing you mercenaries how it's done!" comes a transmission from the guerillas. "We just took out a Hellbringer!"
Zenn7 rolls his eyes. That's probably one of the easiest clan mechs to take down, given its low armor and ammunition stored directly next to the engine (although, to be fair, the engine is an XL engine).
Atrophy's Annihilator rocks after taking a gauss slug and multiple pulse laser blasts from the Grizzly. Atrophy returns fire, planting many LBX pellets into the heavy mech, but both remain upright.
The Cestus (a "classic" 65-ton Star League design) tries to get a piece of Siljanus' Mackie, but a hundred-ton mech packs a lot of armor - the Cestus' left leg no longer has any armor left.
Round 3:
Our two remaining hovercraft continue circling around, taking a little laser fire but delivering some good damage - including our Drillson blowing out a laser on the hostile Flashman. And then a Mongoose chases our Zephyr down and systematically blasts its drive fans off with its medium lasers.
Our three assault mechs engaging the Grizzly and Cestus get into a solid brawl. The Grizzly loses its right arm to continued PPC and laser fire from Zenn7 and Siljanus. The Cestus returns fire, a gauss slug and laser beam doing little other than kicking up water. However, the last laser, maybe because of recoil from armor loss, or maybe because he's a good shot, but Zenn7's targeting system suddenly goes "fuzzy" and the armor indicator on the Awesome's head goes "red".
Atrophy decides to put an end to some of this by cracking the Cestus' right leg.
"Dude, I had his left leg ready to go!" Siljanus cracks.
"Sorry, I'll ask him to hold still next time." Atrophy counters. "Never mind, there we go."
The Cestus then falls over and its left leg cracks anyway.
Round 4:
The Grizzly moves towards Zenn7, whose Awesome is convalescing in a small pond (and slowly evaporating it), snapping off a gauss shot at Atrophy's Annihilator, wrecking one of the LBX autocannons. Surprisingly agile, it still takes multiple LBX hits. Before it can do anything else, Siljanus lifts the Mackie's massive leg and kicks the Grizzly in the back, sending it flying towards Zenn7 - its head bounces off the Awesome's center torso armor, the leg cracks and it settles down on the shoreline.
Round 5:
CJ hops into the facility's perimeter - it's already a total mess with most of the designated buildings blown to bits. Still, there's a Black Knight guarding the interior, and the two mechs exchange fire, neither the Victor nor the slightly lighter laser-focused mech giving any ground.
Atrophy and Siljanus work on one of the remaining target structures, blasting enough holes in it that it likely won't be useable for anything any more.
The guerillas report losing their Wolverine, but being able to take out a Hussar.
Round 6:
The battle seems to be fairly even to the north - the guerillas take down a Flashman but their Archer takes a pounding, leaving them with a Crusader and a Thunderbolt.
Our battle armor gets into the base and engages the remaining units there - a Zephyr hovertank is swarmed by one of our squads, who use their claws to peel bits of armor off the hover tank as Zenn7 helps them with a PPC blast.
The ones trying to swarm the Black Knight don't do so well, but manage to avoid getting squashed.
Round 7:
As we take out the last of the targeted structures, an explosion to the north announces the demise of the allied Archer. CJ uses the opportunity to jump in behind the Black Knight, putting a gauss slug through its back. It's not quite destroyed, but its heat indicator spikes - major engine damage. Some SRMs breach its right arm armor as well, taking out multiple actuators and the PPC.
At this point, we've rendered the facility inoperative for what's going to be a long time - between their buildings being all shot up and the landmines all over the place, it's going to be months if not years before it's back in operation. Despite losing two hovercraft, their crews have made it off the field safely, so we can call it a day and leave - the guerillas are getting pounded and there's still a star of clan mechs up north. Zenn7 sends the message informing them of such decision.
"What? Absolutely not! We need to make good on these two mechs we lost. We held half the clan force for you, you gotta help us out!"
On the one hand, our mechs are a little beat up and it's really high time for us to clear out. On the other hand, maybe we can finish or run off the rest of these clanners and both a) recover our two hovertanks and b) grab salvage.
[] Continue fighting, collect disabled vehicles and salvage
[] Pull back, call it a day
It's a waste - |||||
Whatever, go - |||
Offer to join -> peel out if he refuses |||
Finish off - ||
Whatever, go - |||
Offer to join -> peel out if he refuses |||
Finish off - ||
"Ok, I don't know what have of those words meant." Lich begins. "But it'd be a waste of a good mech... are you even listening to me?"
The Crab scrambles, attempting to get up, slips on the pavement and falls back down before finally managing to get up again, trying to book it to the north, wobbling around ("like a rookie after playing a round of jump-shot" is Lich's exact description), then falling over again. Lich watches with disbelief as the Crab pumps its legs, eventually finding enough purchase on the pavement to yet again try to get up, only to overcompensate and plow into a building. This time, it stops moving.
"You know what, maybe you don't get an offer of a spot in our company. You kind of suck." Lich concludes. "But we're keeping the mech. Salvage teams roll in, you have two hours. Two, Three, you're in charge of local security. Four, back to base with me, I've got a serious headache brewing. And what the hell happened to my leg? Ow."
The haul isn't too bad, although we designate most of it for our Draconis Combine employer. Our liaison informs us that he intends to use the DCMS share to supply the local guerillas. "Perhaps some of these faster units will enable them to show up to battles on time." he adds with a wry smirk. The Crab does have a bunch of double heat sinks we'll be able to pull out, as well as a pair of Star League tech extended-range lasers. Not quite the "front line clan equipment" we were hoping for.
Lich, is out of action for the rest of the month - somehow, our mechwarrior managed to break one of the bones in his leg (and get a concussion, but that'll clear up quicker than the leg will take to heal). Stefan's Trebuchet is going to be out of action as well for the rest of the contract, unless we can scrounge up parts to fix a 50-ton mech's endo-steel arm.
---
May 11, 3054
Caripare, Shared Clan Nova Cat/Smoke Jaguar Administrative Territory
Further recon patrols eventually locate another industrial target - a fairly substantial facility. One of our hovertank patrols tangles with a Nova Cat hovertank star, disabling four out of five and running the other one off; a second hovertank patrol of ours is completely eliminated by a star of light mechs. They do manage to take out a Mongoose via gyro hit while trying to get away. The third (short) hover lance gets through the hostile patrols and plots out a route to the target. They are run off by a star of light mechs, but are able to avoid that engagement.
Zenn7 takes the assault lance in, backed up by two squads of battle armor troopers. We've got Zenn7/Awesome, Siljanus/Mackie, Atrophy/Annihilator and CJ/Victor. The short hover lance is two Drillson hovertanks and a royal Zephyr. The battle armor is two squads of "standard IS battle armor". We'll see how they do.
There are many target structures (eleven), defended by a star of hovertanks, a star of heavy mechs (including a Hellbringer); the light mech lance is also returning from a patrol. On the plus side, the local guerilla forces have committed a heavy mech lance; and they're actually already there when we show up. Amazing.
One of the good parts is that we get our Waddles to sneak in and plant a bunch of landmines before the shooting starts. Not too many, but a good number.
Round 1:
CJ's target, a Zephyr hovertank, dances between the facility's buildings. CJ snaps a shot off from the Victor's gauss rifle, which somehow goes all the way through a building and out the other side, with enough force to blast off a drive fan and cause the hovertank to crash into said building.
Zenn7 and Siljanus inundate a Flashman with PPC fire, but the 75-ton heavy mech's thick armor holds up.
Atrophy doesn't have line of sight on any of this, so the Annihilator just pumps four slug rounds into one of the target buildings, gouging out huge chunks of the structure.
Round 2:
"Showing you mercenaries how it's done!" comes a transmission from the guerillas. "We just took out a Hellbringer!"
Zenn7 rolls his eyes. That's probably one of the easiest clan mechs to take down, given its low armor and ammunition stored directly next to the engine (although, to be fair, the engine is an XL engine).
Atrophy's Annihilator rocks after taking a gauss slug and multiple pulse laser blasts from the Grizzly. Atrophy returns fire, planting many LBX pellets into the heavy mech, but both remain upright.
The Cestus (a "classic" 65-ton Star League design) tries to get a piece of Siljanus' Mackie, but a hundred-ton mech packs a lot of armor - the Cestus' left leg no longer has any armor left.
Round 3:
Our three assault mechs engaging the Grizzly and Cestus get into a solid brawl. The Grizzly loses its right arm to continued PPC and laser fire from Zenn7 and Siljanus. The Cestus returns fire, a gauss slug and laser beam doing little other than kicking up water. However, the last laser, maybe because of recoil from armor loss, or maybe because he's a good shot, but Zenn7's targeting system suddenly goes "fuzzy" and the armor indicator on the Awesome's head goes "red".
Atrophy decides to put an end to some of this by cracking the Cestus' right leg.
"Dude, I had his left leg ready to go!" Siljanus cracks.
"Sorry, I'll ask him to hold still next time." Atrophy counters. "Never mind, there we go."
The Cestus then falls over and its left leg cracks anyway.
Round 4:
Round 5:
Atrophy and Siljanus work on one of the remaining target structures, blasting enough holes in it that it likely won't be useable for anything any more.
The guerillas report losing their Wolverine, but being able to take out a Hussar.
Round 6:
Our battle armor gets into the base and engages the remaining units there - a Zephyr hovertank is swarmed by one of our squads, who use their claws to peel bits of armor off the hover tank as Zenn7 helps them with a PPC blast.
The ones trying to swarm the Black Knight don't do so well, but manage to avoid getting squashed.
Round 7:
At this point, we've rendered the facility inoperative for what's going to be a long time - between their buildings being all shot up and the landmines all over the place, it's going to be months if not years before it's back in operation. Despite losing two hovercraft, their crews have made it off the field safely, so we can call it a day and leave - the guerillas are getting pounded and there's still a star of clan mechs up north. Zenn7 sends the message informing them of such decision.
"What? Absolutely not! We need to make good on these two mechs we lost. We held half the clan force for you, you gotta help us out!"
On the one hand, our mechs are a little beat up and it's really high time for us to clear out. On the other hand, maybe we can finish or run off the rest of these clanners and both a) recover our two hovertanks and b) grab salvage.
[] Continue fighting, collect disabled vehicles and salvage
[] Pull back, call it a day
- Location
- Brazil
- Pronouns
- He
[X] Pull back, call it a day
Not really feeling like going the extra mile for these guys.
Not really feeling like going the extra mile for these guys.
- Location
- Tristania
[X] Continue fighting, collect disabled vehicles and salvage
Chirapare Objective Raid - Week 2.2 (May 11, 3054)
- Location
- New England
Vote Results:
"Fine." Zenn7 responds. "Let's finish these guys off."
Round 8:
CJ and the Drillson hovertank are the only ones that can engage - CJ hops above a PPC fired from a Talon, but takes a grazing medium laser to the dome. Our Victor lands just in time to watch the allied Crusader take multiple lasers and machine gun rounds to the back from the nearby Incubus. It staggers as a leg actuator is hit, then the torso shatters as some LRM ammo goes off; the ejection seat and an arm go flying outward, and the remains of the legs fall to the ground.
CJ's gauss rifle nearly takes the right arm off the Talon attacking him - that ought to reduce its effectiveness with the PPC.
Round 9:
CJ's hit to the Talon's right shoulder pays off - it's unable to bring the PPC to bear and has to be satisfied with landing a grazing laser hit, supported by a laser from a nearby Zephyr. The Zephyr is quickly discouraged as Zenn7 is able to bring the Awesome's PPCs into play, firing through a cluster of buildings to land a shot on its right side.
CJ continues working on the Talon, running the Victor's lasers across its left arm - the shoulder joint fuses and melted actuators can be seen beneath the peeled-off armor.
Round 10:
The Talon runs into the ruined facility - which turns out to be a mistake. Our battle armor is waiting around a corner, blasting the light clan mech with their small lasers, and its left arm goes limp. CJ follows, giving it a few taps with the Victor's SRM launcher, then plants the Victor's 80-ton-rated boot into the back of the light mech - one of its leg actuators snaps. The clan mechwarriors may say they disdain physical attacks, but they have no problem stomping battle armor.
But, just going to show how good battle armor is compared to being an unarmored squishy, the trooper that got pressed into the ground transmits "I'm alive! Holy shit, I'm alive!" after the Talon departs.
Round 11:
The Talon runs past CJ's Victor, rapidly disengaging.
To the north, Atrophy takes some missile fire while observing the Thunderbolt continue to get pounded. It's doing all right against three mechs, two hovertanks and an Elemental point, but there's just too much firepower there in the end. Its armor is breached and the machine gun ammo explodes, sending the mechwarrior for a flight. Our Drillson gets a good hit in on the Incubus while the Thunderbolt's last weapons fire damages the hostile Mongoose, but that's the end of the guerilla guys.
"Great, now they're all gonna shoot at us." Siljanus comments.
Round 12:
Zenn7 braces his mech behind a building, blasting away with PPCs at a Zephyr hovertank to the north. It's not quite eliminated, but a giant smoking hole in its right side armor is enough to convince the crew that this fight is over.
Another Zephyr attempts to engage CJ, melting some armor off the Victor, but takes a gauss slug and some SRMs - the SRMs cause one of the drive fans to disappear, greatly reducing the hovertank's speed.
Round 13:
The other Talon and a Zephyr engage our Drillson as it swoops forward - which is an opportunity Zenn7 takes to stand still and fire PPCs. All three particle beams connect with the light mech, flaying away armor. The left leg separates at the hip while a hit to the center of mass exposes the gyro and engine - it drops to the ground, smoke pouring out.
CJ and our battle armor squad work to corner the Zephyr - it puts up a good fight, lasering off quite a bit of armor from our Victor, but a gauss slug drives through the hovertank, splitting it in half.
Atrophy and Siljanus tangle with the Incubus and a supporting Zephyr - atrophy losing another autocannon in the exchange while the Incubus takes multiple leg and arm armor breaches.
With two mechs, a hovertank and two Elementals (the other three apparently having been eliminated somewhere along the way) facing four assault mechs - even slightly beat up - the rest of the clanners retreat.
We've got two crippled hovertanks that we are able to recover. Damage to our mechs is moderate - Zenn7's Awesome will need its sensor package replaced, while Atrophy's Annihilator lost two of the LBX autocannons and an arm actuator. Zenn7 got lightly dinged, but will be fine. The allied force was basically annihilated - the mechwarriors ejected and survived, but their mechs are gone.
In fact, as our salvage crews start loading stuff onto flatbed trucks for transport to our drop zone, the guy in the Thunderbolt comes limping up and red-faced (and not just because of the multiple cuts and bruises), yelling about how Atrophy blew up his mech so we owe him a new one, and how the liaison's going to hear about this and do we know who he is, and all the usual stuff that pissed off nobles yell about when they get their family mech blown up.
We've coincidentally salvaged a mixed star of mechs.
A Talon - an Ostscout-fast 35-ton mech with an XL engine. Its armor is... well, light, but it packs two medium lasers and an extended-range star-league PPC; things are kept cool by the eleven double heat sinks. This one will need its left leg re-attached and some work on the engine and gyro.
A Hellbringer - heavily armed but not armored 65-ton omnimech, packing clan-spec weaponry. Two large lasers, a medium laser and an ultra AC/5. Its right torso section and an LRM launcher are missing due to an ammo detonation, as are the two machine guns. The mechwarrior ejected, so it'll need a new cockpit as well. Technically, the guerilla guys got this kill, so this would definitely shut the complaints up, but on the other hand it's in-demand clan tech.
A Cestus is a 65-ton classic Star League design. This one doesn't have working legs and the ejection seat has been fired, plust a couple of the star league double heat sinks have been blown out. However, it does have some impressive firepower and decent armor - two large lasers, two medium lasers and a gauss rifle with three tons of ammo. Reasonable speed and the double heat sinks keep it relatively cool.
The Grizzly is not an omnimech, but it's definitely a clan design. The only weapons that survived were a gauss rifle and an LRM/10 launcher, though. It also is missing its entire left side.
Finally, there's Star League Hussar, a 30-ton ultra-fast recon mech with paper thin armor and a single large laser. And double heat sinks for some reason. It lost a leg in the fighting.
So, how do we handle this complaining guy?
[] Ignore him, who gives a crap about some ranting crazy guy
[] Review battle ROM recordings from the Annihilator, that should clear things up. Unless Atrophy did accidentally shoot him.
[] Give him one of the salvaged mechs to shut him up
-[] Pick which one
Keep it going - almost unanimous
"Fine." Zenn7 responds. "Let's finish these guys off."
Round 8:
CJ's gauss rifle nearly takes the right arm off the Talon attacking him - that ought to reduce its effectiveness with the PPC.
Round 9:
CJ continues working on the Talon, running the Victor's lasers across its left arm - the shoulder joint fuses and melted actuators can be seen beneath the peeled-off armor.
Round 10:
But, just going to show how good battle armor is compared to being an unarmored squishy, the trooper that got pressed into the ground transmits "I'm alive! Holy shit, I'm alive!" after the Talon departs.
Round 11:
To the north, Atrophy takes some missile fire while observing the Thunderbolt continue to get pounded. It's doing all right against three mechs, two hovertanks and an Elemental point, but there's just too much firepower there in the end. Its armor is breached and the machine gun ammo explodes, sending the mechwarrior for a flight. Our Drillson gets a good hit in on the Incubus while the Thunderbolt's last weapons fire damages the hostile Mongoose, but that's the end of the guerilla guys.
"Great, now they're all gonna shoot at us." Siljanus comments.
Round 12:
Another Zephyr attempts to engage CJ, melting some armor off the Victor, but takes a gauss slug and some SRMs - the SRMs cause one of the drive fans to disappear, greatly reducing the hovertank's speed.
Round 13:
CJ and our battle armor squad work to corner the Zephyr - it puts up a good fight, lasering off quite a bit of armor from our Victor, but a gauss slug drives through the hovertank, splitting it in half.
Atrophy and Siljanus tangle with the Incubus and a supporting Zephyr - atrophy losing another autocannon in the exchange while the Incubus takes multiple leg and arm armor breaches.
With two mechs, a hovertank and two Elementals (the other three apparently having been eliminated somewhere along the way) facing four assault mechs - even slightly beat up - the rest of the clanners retreat.
We've got two crippled hovertanks that we are able to recover. Damage to our mechs is moderate - Zenn7's Awesome will need its sensor package replaced, while Atrophy's Annihilator lost two of the LBX autocannons and an arm actuator. Zenn7 got lightly dinged, but will be fine. The allied force was basically annihilated - the mechwarriors ejected and survived, but their mechs are gone.
In fact, as our salvage crews start loading stuff onto flatbed trucks for transport to our drop zone, the guy in the Thunderbolt comes limping up and red-faced (and not just because of the multiple cuts and bruises), yelling about how Atrophy blew up his mech so we owe him a new one, and how the liaison's going to hear about this and do we know who he is, and all the usual stuff that pissed off nobles yell about when they get their family mech blown up.
We've coincidentally salvaged a mixed star of mechs.
A Talon - an Ostscout-fast 35-ton mech with an XL engine. Its armor is... well, light, but it packs two medium lasers and an extended-range star-league PPC; things are kept cool by the eleven double heat sinks. This one will need its left leg re-attached and some work on the engine and gyro.
A Hellbringer - heavily armed but not armored 65-ton omnimech, packing clan-spec weaponry. Two large lasers, a medium laser and an ultra AC/5. Its right torso section and an LRM launcher are missing due to an ammo detonation, as are the two machine guns. The mechwarrior ejected, so it'll need a new cockpit as well. Technically, the guerilla guys got this kill, so this would definitely shut the complaints up, but on the other hand it's in-demand clan tech.
A Cestus is a 65-ton classic Star League design. This one doesn't have working legs and the ejection seat has been fired, plust a couple of the star league double heat sinks have been blown out. However, it does have some impressive firepower and decent armor - two large lasers, two medium lasers and a gauss rifle with three tons of ammo. Reasonable speed and the double heat sinks keep it relatively cool.
The Grizzly is not an omnimech, but it's definitely a clan design. The only weapons that survived were a gauss rifle and an LRM/10 launcher, though. It also is missing its entire left side.
Finally, there's Star League Hussar, a 30-ton ultra-fast recon mech with paper thin armor and a single large laser. And double heat sinks for some reason. It lost a leg in the fighting.
So, how do we handle this complaining guy?
[] Ignore him, who gives a crap about some ranting crazy guy
[] Review battle ROM recordings from the Annihilator, that should clear things up. Unless Atrophy did accidentally shoot him.
[] Give him one of the salvaged mechs to shut him up
-[] Pick which one
- Location
- Kansas
[X] Review battle ROM recordings from the Annihilator, that should clear things up. Unless Atrophy did accidentally shoot him.
Quite frankly we owe him shit unless we actually did nail him with something- but we're vets so the likelyhood of us accidentally FFing him are nil.
Quite frankly we owe him shit unless we actually did nail him with something- but we're vets so the likelyhood of us accidentally FFing him are nil.
- Location
- Tristania
[X] Review battle ROM recordings from the Annihilator, that should clear things up. Unless Atrophy did accidentally shoot him.
BA deserves a name for surviving that stomp lol
BA deserves a name for surviving that stomp lol
- Pronouns
- He
[X] Ignore him, who gives a crap about some ranting crazy guy
Start actually showing up for battles and pulling your weight and I'll listen to you.
Start actually showing up for battles and pulling your weight and I'll listen to you.
- Location
- Seattle, Washington
[X] Review battle ROM recordings from the Annihilator, that should clear things up. Unless Atrophy did accidentally shoot him.
If we did hit him, give him the Cestus
If we did hit him, give him the Cestus
Chirapare Objective Raid - Week 2.3 (May 13, 3054)
- Location
- New England
Vote Results:
"... really?" Zenn7 asks, rewinding the footage, the little black box connected to a holo projector in the Thunderball - our Overlord-class dropship. "You just *had* to take that shot, huh?"
Atrophy shrugs. "Stupid bastard kept hitting me with LRMs, I thought he was one of them."
Zenn7 stares. "You thought a classic Thunderbolt was operated by the clans."
"What, they use salvaged Inner Sphere gear." Atrophy counters.
"Sure, but usually they're not shooting at each other." Zenn7 sighs. "Look, just... next time, let the clans blow the allied unit up instead and save your autocannon ammo. Now, you wouldn't have this problem if you used PPCs like a real mechwarrior..."
---
With the ROM recordings showing that a) the Thunderbolt actually shot at Atrophy a couple of times with its LRMs and b) Atrophy accidentally (or "accidentally") dinged the Thunderbolt's machinegun ammo bin with an LBX pellet or two, we decide that Atrophy was "under combat confusion caused by incoming friendly fire". So, as far as we're concerned, the screaming Combine nobleman gets squat. Amazingly, the liaison backs us up, telling him to piss off (using much more polite and euphemism-laden Combine terminology).
"The Draconis Combine does not have much appreciation for incompetence or dishonesty." the liaison explains. "At least on the surface." he adds with a smirk.
With that resolved, our target in this area has been destroyed, so we pack up our dropships and perform an incident-free sub-orbital hop, relocating to our next target's area. A simple but critical communications hub controlling traffic between multiple industrial sites - taking it out will snarl everything for months.
May 13, 3054
As usual, we send out our hovertank patrols to beat the bush and locate it; Delta lance is eventually able to pinpoint it thanks to the Beagle Probe on AWS' Phoenix Hawk LAM. The signal comes from underground. As we move to take a closer look, a transmission comes out on the general frequency.
"This is Star Commander John Rosse to approaching mechs. You are Inner Sphere surats, and therefore not worthy of a proper batchall. However, we will grant you the honor of engaging and destroying your pitiful mechs in combat. I will even take your Nova for myself."
"Great." Freyland states. "Gamma Lance, you there?"
"Yeah." Wolf replies. "We're about a minute out. Sure you don't want to wait for us?"
Freyland shakes his head. "I don't think they're going to give us a choice. Delta Lance - spread out and stay on the move. Let's see if we can just take the facility out and get out."
The hostile mechs resolve to some classic Star League designs - two Black Knights, a Warhammer, a Hoplite and a Lancelot. None are front-line mechs, but the "royal" Star League versions of the Black Knight and Lancelot are nothing to sneeze at.
Delta lance is Freyland/Nova, SgtSoldier/Phoenix Hawk, Akalon/Vulcan, AWS/Phoenix Hawk LAM; Gamma Lance is Wolf/Hellbringer, 9B/Archer, TheMix/Mad Dog, Backwash/Griffin. We also have a Falcon hovertank.
Round 1:
[camera feed disrupted]
"What is this pathetic thing that you send at me?" comes the taunt as our Falcon is evaporated.
Akalon and SgtSoldier focus fire on a Hoplite - a 55-ton mech with no arms. Out of its right side comes a gauss slug, tearing into Akalon's right leg, blowing out an actuator. The enemy mech takes a knee from the incoming fire, but looks fine otherwise.
Round 2:
Freyland jumps up to the lip of the underground crater, unloading the Nova's lasers on a Black Knight - the hostile mech's armor holds up despite the multiple angry red welts.
SgtSoldier and Akalon continue hopping around, firing at the Hoplite, but its armor refuses to yield. SgtSoldier's mech takes a couple of PPC hits as our mechwarrior hops around the Hoplite's back - he gets the rear shot he wanted, but the round-top mech simply rotates and blasts him with its gauss rifle. The Phoenix Hawk's left arm goes limp and the mech is unable to find purchase on the slippery surface, dropping to the ground.
Round 3:
SgtSoldier levers his Phoenix Hawk up, unlike the Hoplite, which continues having to brace itself with a knee to prevent from falling over.
Freyland hops north, instantly regretting it as his Nova gets stuck in some sort of muck. Our mechwarrior continues melting armor off the Black Knight with the Nova's many lasers, status indicators going from green to yellow. Akalon and AWS add their firepower, forcing an armor breach on the target's center torso. SgtSoldier adds a large laser from the Phoenix Hawk's remaining arm, noting with satisfaction the bright blue coolant fluid spraying out from beneath a fried actuator.
Freyland's mech beeps as the left torso loses all of its armor after a PPC and several pulse laser shots, then everything goes white temporarily as a pulse laser makes its way across the Nova's head.
SgtSoldier ducks under a gauss slug, but eats a few SRMs, the Phoenix Hawk losing coolant fluid and a jump jet. Our mechwarrior kicks the Hoplite in the right leg in frustration.
Round 4:
"Watch that muck!" Freyland warns as both SgtSoldier and Akalon get themselves stuck briefly. Not for long, but long enough.
Freyland's lasers melt armor off the other Black Knight - the first one having decided to shut off its searchlight and stop lighting itself up.
"That's one new bondsman." comes a taunt over the general frequency as SgtSoldier's Phoenix Hawk seizes up - its right torso is melted to slag by a laser from the Lancelot and the XL engine immediately shuts down.
Akalon and AWS's added firepower brings the second Black Knight to the ground, however.
Round 5:
Freyland jumps north, forgetting his own advice for a second as Akalon struggles to get out - the Nova's lasers focus in on the target Black Knight's center torso, breaching armor and lighting it up on the heat indicator - an engine hit. Its right arm and attached PPC melt off as well. The incoming fire causes Freyland to drop to the ground entirely.
AWS takes a gauss slug, breaching right torso armor, as the Phoenix Hawk LAM approaches the Hoplite to deliver a kick, dropping the saucer-top mech to a knee again. The kick costs our mechwarrior - the LAM briefly has to make contact with the ground to stabilize, but the same slippery surface that got SgtSoldier earlier gets AWS - the right side of the mech shears off as it crunches against a wall.
Round 6:
With the transformation equipment inoperable and being stuck on the ground like a fish while facing the cave wall, AWS makes the call to power down and climb out.
"A curious little machine, surat." comes the not-entirely-unexpected taunt. "Too bad flight is not generally useful underground."
"Pull back to designated nav point." Freyland calls out. "Let's let the big guys handle the rest of this, we've softened them up enough."
The other thing that is softened up is Freyland's Nova, which loses its left arm, and, consequently, the lasers mounted on it. Four of them. Akalon turns the Vulcan around mid-air and tries to cover his lance leader, blasting a few chunks out of the Lancelot's armor, but it doesn't help much.
Round 7:
"Reinforcements have arrived." Wolf calls out, entering the cave. "Cozy."
The cave is lit up by flashes of PPCs and lasers, as well as a single gauss trail, but nothing connects.
Round 8:
Freyland's left torso section melts under fire from a Black Knight - it's hard to tell which one, but it doesn't matter - the Nova's left arm is now off and it's weaponless.
Wolf moves forward, retaliating with two PPC shots to the right torso, melting the pulse laser mounted there, while the rest of Gamma Lance focuses fire on the Black Knights - although TheMix delivers a pulse laser blast to the Lancelot, causing an armor breach.
"Ah, finally, a challenge." comes the taunt.
Round 9:
With one of the Black Knights trying to retreat from the cavern, the odds are a little bit more in our favor - we have four pristine mechs to their four beat-up mechs. 9B attracts a good amount of firepower, but the Archer's armor holds up. The Black Knight at which Wolf and Backwash fire, however, wobbles and falls over, breaching its right torso armor.
Round 10:
The clanner appears to have stopped sending out taunts now that we have the upper hand in mass and firepower - especially when Backwash sends a bunch of LRMs into the Hoplite's cockpit, taking it down. Backwash's right arm is exposed after a gauss slug hits it directly, but armor replacement isn't a problem for us.
9B's LRM salvo may have also soured his mood a little more directly, with multiple armor breaches.
Round 11:
It's TheMix's turn to slip on the slick yet hard surface, cracking one of the Mad Dog's pulse lasers. Our mechwarrior gets back in the game however, sawing off the remaining Black Knight's arm, while Wolf's PPCs and lasers take the left one off. It's not quite an even amount of mass off both sides however, so the heavy mech becomes unbalanced and keels over, literally glowing from both externally applied heat and its engine going crazy with all the missing heat sinks.
Backwash switches targets to the Lancelot, pinging it in the left torso and dinging the engine, while 9B swaps LRMs in exchange for PPC fire from the Warhammer.
Round 12:
Backwash appears to be on fire today - as TheMix blasts it with the Mad Dog's pulse lasers, it rocks a little bit and staggers, giving our Griffin a chance to line up its long-range weapons. The LRMs arrow in on the upper torso section, including a few to the head, and the 70-tonner slowly drops to the ground.
The Lancelot takes fire from 9B and Wolf, losing most of the rest of its weapons.
"You've defeated me this time, surats, with your dishonorable tactics, but I will see you destroyed yet!" comes the final "taunt" over the general frequency.
Wolf smirks. "I look forward to seeing you try."
The three surviving clanners disengage, limping out of the cave, leaving our salvage crews to pick over the two mechs we took down and recover ours as well. Our salvage ratio isn't that great from the five mechs we recovered after the last fight, so the Hoplite and Warhammer go into the segment of the Jumbo designated for Kurita salvage. That's all right, they're not that great.
Freyland's mech is pretty beat up, as are AWS' and SgtSoldier. Akalon's Vulcan escaped catastrophic damage, but still has a damaged leg actuator.
---
We pack it in again and head towards our final target - a major distribution center for manufactured products - clan weapons, etc. The letter of our contract is pretty clear - we blow it up, then we leave. Our liaison suggests that we can waylay and capture some of the convoys heading in and out of the area, getting our pick of extra salvage (which hasn't been terribly plentiful this contract) and helping equip local resistance forces with the rest.
Delta and Zeta lance are out of action for a while, but we've got four fully functional lances we can commit to this. There are three convoys we've identified so far, so that could be a pretty good amount of equipment. Of course, the longer we hang out here, the more chances that our Star Commander pal gets his mech fixed up and comes after us again, with more firepower.
How many of the convoys do we hit?
[] One
[] Two
[] Three
[] Zero, just hit the distribution center and bug out
-Give Hellbringer |
-Give Hussar ||
-Review ROM recordings -> Give Hellbringer ||
-Review ROM recordings -> Give Cestus |
-Review ROM recordings
-Ignore ||
-Give Hussar ||
-Review ROM recordings -> Give Hellbringer ||
-Review ROM recordings -> Give Cestus |
-Review ROM recordings
-Ignore ||
"... really?" Zenn7 asks, rewinding the footage, the little black box connected to a holo projector in the Thunderball - our Overlord-class dropship. "You just *had* to take that shot, huh?"
Atrophy shrugs. "Stupid bastard kept hitting me with LRMs, I thought he was one of them."
Zenn7 stares. "You thought a classic Thunderbolt was operated by the clans."
"What, they use salvaged Inner Sphere gear." Atrophy counters.
"Sure, but usually they're not shooting at each other." Zenn7 sighs. "Look, just... next time, let the clans blow the allied unit up instead and save your autocannon ammo. Now, you wouldn't have this problem if you used PPCs like a real mechwarrior..."
---
With the ROM recordings showing that a) the Thunderbolt actually shot at Atrophy a couple of times with its LRMs and b) Atrophy accidentally (or "accidentally") dinged the Thunderbolt's machinegun ammo bin with an LBX pellet or two, we decide that Atrophy was "under combat confusion caused by incoming friendly fire". So, as far as we're concerned, the screaming Combine nobleman gets squat. Amazingly, the liaison backs us up, telling him to piss off (using much more polite and euphemism-laden Combine terminology).
"The Draconis Combine does not have much appreciation for incompetence or dishonesty." the liaison explains. "At least on the surface." he adds with a smirk.
With that resolved, our target in this area has been destroyed, so we pack up our dropships and perform an incident-free sub-orbital hop, relocating to our next target's area. A simple but critical communications hub controlling traffic between multiple industrial sites - taking it out will snarl everything for months.
May 13, 3054
As usual, we send out our hovertank patrols to beat the bush and locate it; Delta lance is eventually able to pinpoint it thanks to the Beagle Probe on AWS' Phoenix Hawk LAM. The signal comes from underground. As we move to take a closer look, a transmission comes out on the general frequency.
"This is Star Commander John Rosse to approaching mechs. You are Inner Sphere surats, and therefore not worthy of a proper batchall. However, we will grant you the honor of engaging and destroying your pitiful mechs in combat. I will even take your Nova for myself."
"Great." Freyland states. "Gamma Lance, you there?"
"Yeah." Wolf replies. "We're about a minute out. Sure you don't want to wait for us?"
Freyland shakes his head. "I don't think they're going to give us a choice. Delta Lance - spread out and stay on the move. Let's see if we can just take the facility out and get out."
The hostile mechs resolve to some classic Star League designs - two Black Knights, a Warhammer, a Hoplite and a Lancelot. None are front-line mechs, but the "royal" Star League versions of the Black Knight and Lancelot are nothing to sneeze at.
Delta lance is Freyland/Nova, SgtSoldier/Phoenix Hawk, Akalon/Vulcan, AWS/Phoenix Hawk LAM; Gamma Lance is Wolf/Hellbringer, 9B/Archer, TheMix/Mad Dog, Backwash/Griffin. We also have a Falcon hovertank.
Round 1:
[camera feed disrupted]
"What is this pathetic thing that you send at me?" comes the taunt as our Falcon is evaporated.
Akalon and SgtSoldier focus fire on a Hoplite - a 55-ton mech with no arms. Out of its right side comes a gauss slug, tearing into Akalon's right leg, blowing out an actuator. The enemy mech takes a knee from the incoming fire, but looks fine otherwise.
Round 2:
SgtSoldier and Akalon continue hopping around, firing at the Hoplite, but its armor refuses to yield. SgtSoldier's mech takes a couple of PPC hits as our mechwarrior hops around the Hoplite's back - he gets the rear shot he wanted, but the round-top mech simply rotates and blasts him with its gauss rifle. The Phoenix Hawk's left arm goes limp and the mech is unable to find purchase on the slippery surface, dropping to the ground.
Round 3:
Freyland hops north, instantly regretting it as his Nova gets stuck in some sort of muck. Our mechwarrior continues melting armor off the Black Knight with the Nova's many lasers, status indicators going from green to yellow. Akalon and AWS add their firepower, forcing an armor breach on the target's center torso. SgtSoldier adds a large laser from the Phoenix Hawk's remaining arm, noting with satisfaction the bright blue coolant fluid spraying out from beneath a fried actuator.
Freyland's mech beeps as the left torso loses all of its armor after a PPC and several pulse laser shots, then everything goes white temporarily as a pulse laser makes its way across the Nova's head.
SgtSoldier ducks under a gauss slug, but eats a few SRMs, the Phoenix Hawk losing coolant fluid and a jump jet. Our mechwarrior kicks the Hoplite in the right leg in frustration.
Round 4:
Freyland's lasers melt armor off the other Black Knight - the first one having decided to shut off its searchlight and stop lighting itself up.
"That's one new bondsman." comes a taunt over the general frequency as SgtSoldier's Phoenix Hawk seizes up - its right torso is melted to slag by a laser from the Lancelot and the XL engine immediately shuts down.
Akalon and AWS's added firepower brings the second Black Knight to the ground, however.
Round 5:
AWS takes a gauss slug, breaching right torso armor, as the Phoenix Hawk LAM approaches the Hoplite to deliver a kick, dropping the saucer-top mech to a knee again. The kick costs our mechwarrior - the LAM briefly has to make contact with the ground to stabilize, but the same slippery surface that got SgtSoldier earlier gets AWS - the right side of the mech shears off as it crunches against a wall.
Round 6:
"A curious little machine, surat." comes the not-entirely-unexpected taunt. "Too bad flight is not generally useful underground."
"Pull back to designated nav point." Freyland calls out. "Let's let the big guys handle the rest of this, we've softened them up enough."
The other thing that is softened up is Freyland's Nova, which loses its left arm, and, consequently, the lasers mounted on it. Four of them. Akalon turns the Vulcan around mid-air and tries to cover his lance leader, blasting a few chunks out of the Lancelot's armor, but it doesn't help much.
Round 7:
The cave is lit up by flashes of PPCs and lasers, as well as a single gauss trail, but nothing connects.
Round 8:
Wolf moves forward, retaliating with two PPC shots to the right torso, melting the pulse laser mounted there, while the rest of Gamma Lance focuses fire on the Black Knights - although TheMix delivers a pulse laser blast to the Lancelot, causing an armor breach.
"Ah, finally, a challenge." comes the taunt.
Round 9:
Round 10:
9B's LRM salvo may have also soured his mood a little more directly, with multiple armor breaches.
Round 11:
Backwash switches targets to the Lancelot, pinging it in the left torso and dinging the engine, while 9B swaps LRMs in exchange for PPC fire from the Warhammer.
Round 12:
The Lancelot takes fire from 9B and Wolf, losing most of the rest of its weapons.
"You've defeated me this time, surats, with your dishonorable tactics, but I will see you destroyed yet!" comes the final "taunt" over the general frequency.
Wolf smirks. "I look forward to seeing you try."
The three surviving clanners disengage, limping out of the cave, leaving our salvage crews to pick over the two mechs we took down and recover ours as well. Our salvage ratio isn't that great from the five mechs we recovered after the last fight, so the Hoplite and Warhammer go into the segment of the Jumbo designated for Kurita salvage. That's all right, they're not that great.
Freyland's mech is pretty beat up, as are AWS' and SgtSoldier. Akalon's Vulcan escaped catastrophic damage, but still has a damaged leg actuator.
---
We pack it in again and head towards our final target - a major distribution center for manufactured products - clan weapons, etc. The letter of our contract is pretty clear - we blow it up, then we leave. Our liaison suggests that we can waylay and capture some of the convoys heading in and out of the area, getting our pick of extra salvage (which hasn't been terribly plentiful this contract) and helping equip local resistance forces with the rest.
Delta and Zeta lance are out of action for a while, but we've got four fully functional lances we can commit to this. There are three convoys we've identified so far, so that could be a pretty good amount of equipment. Of course, the longer we hang out here, the more chances that our Star Commander pal gets his mech fixed up and comes after us again, with more firepower.
How many of the convoys do we hit?
[] One
[] Two
[] Three
[] Zero, just hit the distribution center and bug out
- Location
- Columbus, Ohio
Call me greedy.
[X] Three
[X] Three
- Location
- Brazil
[X] Two