[X] Take Zh'viathon's suggestion, which will mean you are easily trackable, but are more resillient to attacks.
[X] Do not prepare an ambush in this manner. This will preserve torpedoes, and does not preclude you coming up with another idea.
[X] Go covert. Higher difficulty (8s vs 5s) and you'll be more dependent on the luck rolls for the three investigation phases, but very low risk of blowback.
[X] ... she is ill, and accidentally overslept.
[X] Go covert. Higher difficulty (8s vs 5s) and you'll be more dependent on the luck rolls for the three investigation phases, but very low risk of blowback.
[X] Take Zh'viathon's suggestion, which will mean you are easily trackable, but are more resillient to attacks.
[X] Do not prepare an ambush in this manner. This will preserve torpedoes, and does not preclude you coming up with another idea.
[X] Go covert. Higher difficulty (8s vs 5s) and you'll be more dependent on the luck rolls for the three investigation phases, but very low risk of blowback.
[X] ... she is ill, and accidentally overslept.
"Hmm." You muse. "I think Zh'viathon has the right of it. We'll need to know they're tracking us, though. I don't want to preplace torpedoes - but if you can come up with another solution, I'm all ears."
Nadeshiko nods. Delarnious leans forward. "Let's go quietly. I don't want them to know we're on to it until the last possible moment."
Hamasaki nods. You frown. "Where is Lieutenant Bairen?"
There's looks exchanged, and you tap your badge. "Parhai to Bairen."
There's no response, then a very ill voice. "Bairen here. Apologies, Commander. I overslept." You look at Nana, and she nods. "We'll send a medical officer down there to get you to sickbay. Get yourself checked out first."
"Acknowledged, Commander." Nana is already giving the order.
"Let's be about it then." You say, and the meeting breaks up.
[Investigation Rolls: 6d+(7d/2) => 10d (rounded up); 6s; failure; 1d100 chance to recover (8, failure); luck roll 81 (pass)]
[Investigation Rolls: 6d+(7d/2) => 10d (rounded up); 7s; failure; 1d100 chance to recover (97, success); luck roll 18 (failure)]
[Investigation Rolls: 6d+(7d/2) => 10d (rounded up); 3s; failure; 1d100 chance to recover (47, failure); luck roll 47 (pass, complication.)]
[Investigation Rolls: 6d+(7d/2) => 10d (rounded up); 8s; success, 1d100 chance for extra progress (10, failure; luck roll 51 (pass)]
(2 successes +3 luck+ 1 complication)
The team under Hamasaki had to struggle at first, but eventually made progress in back tracing the conversations and information. It eventually back traces to Home Sector Defense, Starfleet Operations.
That... will be a problem. More so, there's another problem. The investigation seems to have alerted the Assembly Security Services, in a move that frankly baffles Hamasaki, and Delarnious. Why do they care?
The Assembly Security Services is more a physical guard and the cybersecurity measures of the Assembly, and answers to Federation Security in general, being a rotating detachment of it. And almost all of the time, they are completely irrelevant.
You need to resolve this before attempting to isolate who of the ten-thousand people Home Sector Defense comprises of could be behind this, but it does argue badly that it's Home Sector Defense rather than the various regional commands.
You could try the diplomatic approach to find out why they care, but there's a real risk you'll get reported on, and with your current reputation, that's fairly risky.
Hamasaki has contacts, but it'll take longer, and you run a risk of them covering their tracks if they're unlucky.
[ ] Diplomatic Approach (Medium difficulty, Failure Risk: Dismissal roll; Mitigations: You have two relevant traits.)
[ ] Friend-of-a-friend Approach (Medium difficulty, Failure Risk: Chance of covering tracks. Mitigations: Hamasaki has one trait, Delarnious another.)
[1d10 -> 10]
Dr. Nana reports in that Bairen is sick of ... the flu. So is some of the intelligence attaches. They're back up now, and working with Hamasaki.
(+2d to next rolls)
Nadeshiko is busy wargaming out possible scenarios with the tactical department, but you need to pick a path, knowing you're almost certainly being followed.
[ ] A red dwarf with five gas giants and *nine* asteroid belts. Plenty of places of hide.. or encounter forces hiding from you.
[ ] A more normal yellow star, with no habitable planets.
[ ] A dark nebula.. (Both of you will find it hard to find each other.)
Minovsky is proposing modifying of some of the stellar survey equipment to act as a crude sensor that wouldn't neccessarily be detected as one by other settings.
It would take some time, and could potentially have some issues with either power flows or sensors.
[ ] With a Medium difficulty roll, this can be rectified
[ ] We cannot risk it.
The issue is, even with the help, you'll have three ships. Versus 12.
[ ] Write-In Plan ideas to suggest to your officers to refine.
[X] Diplomatic Approach (Medium difficulty, Failure Risk: Dismissal roll; Mitigations: You have two relevant traits.)
[X] A dark nebula.. (Both of you will find it hard to find each other.)
[X] With a Medium difficulty roll, this can be rectified
[X] Write-In: So they got us beat in numbers then the only good idea is to lower those numbers, inside a dark nebula we can set up some type of decoys one for each ship on ours side and mine them with some Torpedoes and a sensor ( if we got one to spare) to pinpoint them to attack then
[X] Write-In: So they got us beat in numbers then the only good idea is to lower those numbers, inside a dark nebula we can set up some type of decoys one for each ship on ours side and mine them with some Torpedoes and a sensor ( if we got one to spare) to pinpoint them to attack then
[X] Diplomatic Approach (Medium difficulty, Failure Risk: Dismissal roll; Mitigations: You have two relevant traits.)
[X] A dark nebula.. (Both of you will find it hard to find each other.)
[X] With a Medium difficulty roll, this can be rectified
[X] Write-In: So they got us beat in numbers then the only good idea is to lower those numbers, inside a dark nebula we can set up some type of decoys one for each ship on ours side and mine them with some Torpedoes and a sensor ( if we got one to spare) to pinpoint them to attack then
(Diplomacy Roll + Command Roll => 11d, 7 successes required; 2 mitigations; 10 successes (1 crit fail mitigated))
You end up spending some time in conversing with the Federation Security detachment, and it took both a diplomatic approach, and a leadership approach in the end, but one bit stuck out to you.
"Why were you tracing through Assembly networks?" The detachment leader asks you, his eyes narrowed.
"We were trying to track some leaked deployment info from Starfleet Command." You answer -mostly honestly-, back. "We were very surprised to see that it even went through the Assembly."
The man pales a bit, then asks for a moment to verify this. While he does that, you reflect on the fact that Home Sector Defense was a wartime invention. Before the War, while a majority of population was concentrated in the "Core" of the Federation, most of the advanced production was in the very core of the Federation. The war both made this worse and better. Several deliberate attempts to create regional centers to disperse production did occur, but the destruction meant a supermajority was focused in the core sectors.
And to be fair, after the attack on Vulcan, there was a need to re think sector defense from the old patrolling ships and starbase model, with the static defenses bypassable all-too-frequently, and while those remain the majority of the defenses, many systems now have local defense forces and more local oversight into their defenses, and Starfleet has assigned three nodal forces to Core Worlds.
.. and their shipyards, and their massive in-space production yards, such as Yoyodyne Propulsion Yards.
The fact they haven't done this to other concentrations has been noticed, but Starfleet (correctly, in your estimation) pointed out that downsizing means they can only assign one nodal force there, and often they have to also patrol the sector. There's a committee looking into this, and you're sure they'll get to some conclusion in 2359.
All this made this a more political question - and in fact, you seem to recall someone springboarding a career. A quick search reveals some interesting patterns - a lot of Sector Defense commanders rise in rank or become Assembly people. You note a few very interesting people from Starfleet now serving in the Assembly, including the current Assemblywoman of Karin's Rest, a new Earth colony. You file this mentally away when the man returns.
"We have verified some unauthorized.. and potentially authorized use. We will investigate on our end, but we must disclose this within as little as potentially 12 hours."
You nod, and and as the conversation cuts out, Hamasaki emerges from behind the wall she had been listening on.
"Intersting." She murmurs. "We'll acclerate."
(The investigation will finish next turn.)
As you near the nebula, Yanagshira approaches you with a plan she's worked out with Kenni and Zh'viathion - to set up decoys with torpedos that can act as a decoy, or at the very minimalist launchers. After a hurried consultation with Delarnious, she goes to set them up.
You discuss the plan with the Romulan Commander, who seems enthuasatic about it. Between the two of you, you rig up four decoys, with torpedos and such. You'll need to lay doggo for a bit, but it gives you a lot better odds.
There's an improvement to sensors set up, but it works a lot better on the Romulan ships than yours. Still, it is an improvement in both range and resolution. Dalirath passes back some suggestions from the ship - and some training and reading notes, you note with amusement- , and Kenni and Minovsky work to implement them, but soon hit a disagreement.
This was the downside of having two people being co-chief. They come to you for a decision..
[ ] Kenni wants to enhance the sensors with more EPS taps. This will solve the problem, but means they are more prone to getting damaged in the attack, and risk a cascading flow damaging the deck. However, the ship will not have ghost-image issues.
[ ] Minovsky wants to replace a few sensor heads and re-align and lay some runs. This will also solve the problem, but means they could lag and will potentially emit ghost images, making it harder to target enemy ships. However, the ship will not be more prone to damage.
Regardless, you set in for a wait. How do you want to fight the battle?
[ ] Attack as soon as you're sure
[ ] Wait until you have a superior position or they fire on your decoys. Then use the decoys as an additional launcher.
[ ] (Romulan Commander's preferred option) Have the decoys attack on attack, but follow the raiders out and attack them at the last moment they're in the nebula. This runs the risk of enhanced chances to detect you.
[X] Kenni wants to enhance the sensors with more EPS taps. This will solve the problem, but means they are more prone to getting damaged in the attack, and risk a cascading flow damaging the deck. However, the ship will not have ghost-image issues.
[X] Wait until you have a superior position or they fire on your decoys. Then use the decoys as an additional launcher.
[x] Kenni wants to enhance the sensors with more EPS taps. This will solve the problem, but means they are more prone to getting damaged in the attack, and risk a cascading flow damaging the deck. However, the ship will not have ghost-image issues.
[X] Wait until you have a superior position or they fire on your decoys. Then use the decoys as an additional launcher.
Scheduled vote count started by KNakamura on Jul 20, 2024 at 7:13 PM, finished with 5 posts and 2 votes.
[X] Kenni wants to enhance the sensors with more EPS taps. This will solve the problem, but means they are more prone to getting damaged in the attack, and risk a cascading flow damaging the deck. However, the ship will not have ghost-image issues.
[X] Kenni wants to enhance the sensors with more EPS taps. This will solve the problem, but means they are more prone to getting damaged in the attack, and risk a cascading flow damaging the deck. However, the ship will not have ghost-image issues.
[X] Wait until you have a superior position or they fire on your decoys. Then use the decoys as an additional launcher.
You cut off all communications, and so do the Romulans, going into grey mode.
[Random roll: 1d10 -> 4]
A spy is caught. This doesn't fill you with any joy, as she was reporting to Starfleet Operations and technically had the orders to do so, but after routine questioning with an advocate present from the FedSec detachment, she is sent to the brig for attempting to violate the grey mode order
[Morale -1; suspicion swirls]
The battle starts out well. The decoys each take out a ship before they are destroyed and the fire from you and the Romulans knocks out another 3, dropping the enemy down to 6.
Yanagashira had been a little suspicious about why they had followed the decoy signature in, and their counter fire, with added weaponry was brutal, targeting wide swaths and causing packets in nebula itself to explode.
You rapidly lose a few decks, and the Romulans are also taking a beating. You don't get any ships during this phase of the battle and soon the Romulans break and run. But it's clear they had learnt from the raiders actions, using the phasers and sacrificing fighters on remote to allow you also the chance to run.
They aren't as successful as they would have liked, but they do knock out 2 ships. They might have diverted attention if you hadn't taken advantage to unleash your own attempt at a counter fire blitz, although this was more in daredevil piloting.
Your fire knocked them down to one ship, and the Orion raider, now very damaged, attempted to signal a surrender.. only for all of the wreckage to self destruct including the ship.
Whatever you could have learnt here is no more, and the nebula itself is under going a chain reaction.
You need to escape..but the warp drive is offline and the ship is heavily damaged.
[] Maximum impulse, shields at full. (13s difficulty.)
[] Modulate the shields to use the explosions as propulsion. (7s, will have consequences, likely fatalities)
[] Focus on warp drive and impulse. (9s)
The dice were bipolar, handing you both 0 successes in phase 2 (the Romulans got 2 crit fails) and you 2 crit successes in phase 1 and 3. The Romulans did not fair as well.
Okay, with.. all of one vote in a week, I think it's *somewhat safe* to call this dead.
That said, I'll still get a post out with the results of this vote and wrapping up the episode over the next week (I'll be on vacation, so I'll have time to put out a good episode ending.)
Thanks to everyone who's voted and participated! I appreciate it.
