shinkiro
absolute madmage
- Location
- Gensokyo
yeah, that mission in ac7 was dope.
having played 4, i was like 'wait, come again, you want me to *defend* stonehedge?
-
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Ace Combat XCOM: Enemy Skies
- Thread starter hYGP
- Start date
yeah, that mission in ac7 was dope.
having played 4, i was like 'wait, come again, you want me to *defend* stonehedge?
- Location
- USA
Restoring Stonehenge is actually a great idea. During the continental war it gave the Eruseans continent wide flak and during Lighthouse it no selled the Ark birds shield, something that even invader ships have a hard time doing. We pull this off we can all but eliminate the invader capacity to preform any kind of serious operations in Usea.
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- Location
- Mid-Atlantic
Just because the description says "focuses on maneuverability" doesn't mean it's the most maneuverable plane available.
If you want a supermaneuverable plane with the aforementioned weapons, your options are to get the Su-57 and arm it with pulse laser pods, or wait for Charlie to come up with something... better... oh snap.
OK.
This is a good plane. But it is, alas, NOT super-special weapon capable.
We'll take a bunch, but we should also still take Su-33-EMLs soon, unless we can get a high-end special weapon on this basic plane. I'll come up with a revised plan accordingly.
Suggestion: rephrase that as modify. I don't mind if the F-14Y sacrifices a bit of performance in exchange for being EML-capable, in other words.
Hopefully Dr. Shen will consider this as 'all options on table.' Redesigning a plane with a heavier autocannon is hard, but coming up with new ammunition to fire through the old one is easy.
HmmMMM. Well, I wish we could get more special heavy weapons, but standardizing on a high-performance low-cost jet for the bulk of our forces is probably worth it.
Next turn I'd like to equip more Su-33-EMLs or other special weapon planes, or start work on an F-14Y that can carry the EML, TLS, or PLSL.
Hm. I don't necessarily want to impose a four-plane force structure on everything. Two-plane teams can be useful in specified roles for which a four-plane squadron would be overkill. Until and unless we have something like six to eight full four-ship squadrons, we need the flexibility of smaller units.
I think we can live with sharing the loot here. Among other things, some of the other X-COM branches have taken a beating; if we don't want them to fold and force us to take up their slack, we need to remember to throw them a bone once in a while.
Ehhh.
It's a great baseline for us to make sure everyone is well equipped and no one's tooling around in an F-15C. But we'll still want higher-end special weapon capability soon. Our lack of firepower is seriously handicapping us.
I got nothing right now. We can't use "Little Boy" because she's a woman as I understand it.
1) Speaking as the author of the plan, thanks! That was basically my reasoning, yeah. Fast planes, at least one true ace of aces type (even if 'only' SS-tier), with very long range weapons that are nonetheless not super-weapons. Ideal for a stern chase.
2) I'd figured that ramming might be sacrificial for the shield ship, or at least put it at great risk, and that they might not want to take that risk twice in rapid succession. But yeah, it did turn out to be a relief. As to whether it was overkill... Well, saving the Arsenal Bird was, in that moment, a top priority, and when I want something dead, I point an SSR-tier ace at it and pull the trigger.
3) Furthermore, given that keeping them tied up was seriously important, it had to be somebody good, and preferably a numerous squadron that they couldn't gang up on three-on-one or anything. Given how much trouble they were giving the Galm Team, I figured that it would be a lot safer to throw four planes at them rather than two. Which meant either Strider or the Razgriz, and the Razgriz were specifically needed for something else that they were by far best suited for. Also, see previous. I was fondly hoping we could score a kill on Flowing Guard Unbreakable as a stretch goal. So I pointed an SSR-tier ace at them and pulled the Trigger.
4) Subject to the constraints above, you see my problem. Imagine I'd had Strider Squadron flying cover for the attacks on the shield ships, but kept the Razgriz on the fighters attacking our AWACS. Who would I have thrown at Flowing Guard Unbreakable, then? Rigel and Salamander! I don't know if any of them would have survived the experience.
6) I honestly suspected that if we did anything besides Galm Team the Reunion Tour, Pixy might have just ignored orders and done it anyway. Better to go with the flow, especially when "the flow" has historically turned the tide of major air battles before.
14) Good to hear. If it had been me, I would have just said "Dormarch 1 "Elcero" has returned."
This is definitely on the collective agenda; it was even alluded to in the OP of the thread.
Yeah. This time we don't have to be covert about getting it working.
- Location
- Meycauayan, Bulacan, Philippines
Okay, so I finally have some time to sit down today, and took that time to slam a couple more bugs and finalize the shape of the anti-alien aircraft you had Burns make, given the key constraints of:
This will also be in the update for this vote, not the debriefing update.
- Cheap
- Extreme manueverability
- Immediate results.
An unopened video message from Charlie pops up on Long Caster's tablet.
Charlie is bouncing up and down, nearly jumping for joy. The camera's pointed to the runway, where F-14s start their ignition sequence.
"Hey boss. I got you your plane. We haven't finished working out the kinks, but I got - " Charlie yells over the roars of engines that do not belong to F-14s. "Fencer and Lanza right?!" One of the launch techs gives him a thumbs up, "Fencer and Lanza in my best work yet, the F-14X!"
"Lame!" someone calls out over the roar of jet engines.
"I don't wanna hear it from you, Miss XAF-1!" Charlie yells back, turning towards the plane. "Anyway, we took an F-14D and tricked it out with thrust vectoring, canards, modernized avionics and six empennage surfaces! I call it the 'snowflake tail'!"
"We took everything good about the F-14 and made it approximately a billion percent better!" Charlie shouts, as the F-14X trundles down the runway. Long Caster, looking closer, can only see six hardpoints total. "This baby can't fit any more six missiles at a time, but it handles everything else like a champ!"
Charlie takes a moment. "Well, excluding one other thing, but that fucker destroys everything anyway," he muses, as the F-14X takes off with more than half the runway to go.
The two F-14Xs arc up, and then over the runway, barely a hundred meters over. The two dance across the sky, and Long Caster can barely contain his smile either.
"So, boss, what do you think?"
F-14X XCOM Hellcat II
Cost: 2400 IC
Carrier Capable: Yes
Special Weapons:
QAAM
SAAM
SASM
XMA4
XLAA
A large carrier aircraft. Based on the F-14D's airframe, Charlie Burns has upgraded nearly everything except the frame itself, and even on the frame he added canards and more tail control surfaces. The end result, Charlie says, is a plane that's second or third best in a lot of categories; maneuverability second to the likes of the Wyvern or Nosferatu, avionics second to the likes of the F-35C, and speed second to the Mig-31. Compared to any one of those, however, Charlie thinks the F-14X stacks up.
I really think this should be threadmarked too. Also, can we as for loans from the private sector for extra money?
Worst comes to worst, we let the corporations paint our aircraft skins with advertisements for money. Like that Pepsi thing with an F-14. Or was that a Harrier?
shinkiro
absolute madmage
- Location
- Gensokyo
sniping the enemy right out of the sky will be fun
bonus points if its a mothership
- Location
- Meycauayan, Bulacan, Philippines
Also another thing @huhYeahGoodPoint.
Do you have concrete numbers for the maneuverability of all the planes in this quest in your stats? Can you tell the rankings to us?
Do you have concrete numbers for the maneuverability of all the planes in this quest in your stats? Can you tell the rankings to us?
- Pronouns
- He/Him/His
I think we really need to hear from Pulford.
We got our stories badly wrong with respect to Osea; we need to find some time to get that straightened out. I don't care so much about the loot - I think we can give a bigger share to our good friends - but I am extremely concerned about the extent of Belkan influence in Osea generally, and Grunder Industries specifically.
We can task taking care of those problems to others, but we need to hear about what those problems are.
We got our stories badly wrong with respect to Osea; we need to find some time to get that straightened out. I don't care so much about the loot - I think we can give a bigger share to our good friends - but I am extremely concerned about the extent of Belkan influence in Osea generally, and Grunder Industries specifically.
We can task taking care of those problems to others, but we need to hear about what those problems are.
- Location
- Somewhere over the rainbow
Not yet. He still has not yet hit the skill level he achieved in his duel with Pixy over Avalon Dam.14) Good to hear. If it had been me, I would have just said "Dormarch 1 "Elcero" has returned."
IC is not money. In fact, it is an abbreviation of Industrial Capacity. This is to represent the fact that XCOM's budget is so big that money is effectively not an issue to you; the real issue is and will continue to be what factory space, what logistical network time, what industrial expertise you can secure for the time duration. In essence, Industrial Capacity.
Note, also, that every single IC invested in you is IC that is not invested into their own country; Gunther Bay Emergency Administration is badly straining under the weight of trying to both restore living standards to their citizens and keep you supplied with the majority of its remaining Industrial Capacity.
Yes. You will have to do something to earn knowing the exact numbers.
Impress me.
To be clear: do you want to hear from Pulford in the plan, or do you want to hear from Pulford before planning is over?
Because if you want to hear from him, that's what the Status Report is for. He has in fact budgeted extra time, something that fills Long Caster with some small amount of dread.
If you want to talk to Pulford before I write up a full update, get two other people to sign off on it.
- Location
- Meycauayan, Bulacan, Philippines
@huhYeahGoodPoint, does that mean you're asking for an impressive omake?
- Location
- Mid-Atlantic
@Icipall
Would you be willing to remove the line about four-plane structure, specifically, from your plan? I'd support it then, but I have misgivings about trying to force four-plane structure on all our pilots.
Well, "he's back" doesn't mean "he's back and as terrible and formidable as he ever was."
We clearly need to know a lot.
Would you be willing to remove the line about four-plane structure, specifically, from your plan? I'd support it then, but I have misgivings about trying to force four-plane structure on all our pilots.
Another thing we should look into is mounting one and two-gun mini-Stonehenge sites all over the goddamn place.sniping the enemy right out of the sky will be fun
Hm. Yeah, but I share huhYeah's question: exactly who are you proposing to talk to, and about what?
Heh.Not yet. He still has not yet hit the skill level he achieved in his duel with Pixy over Avalon Dam.
Well, "he's back" doesn't mean "he's back and as terrible and formidable as he ever was."
I am signing off on this.
We clearly need to know a lot.
- Location
- USA
Ditto for me more info is always better.
- Pronouns
- He/Him/His
The argument for:
- With Belka being Belka, the political layer is where we lose the game. We need to make sure that Belka's defection does not cause a cascading series of losses at the political layer -- specifically, Kaluga, Free Erusea, and Leasath defecting and tying up military assets and IC needed to defend the planet. "Not losing" is a higher priority than "winning" -- we're not in a position where we can just ignore the weakest members of our coalition.
- Will anything in the plan we set out meaningfully affect the political losses?
I think there's a decent argument for the other side, but in the end I think "yes, hearing from Pulford as soon as possible" is probably worth it.
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Icipall
Don't worry, we can fanfix that!
- Location
- Cold snow fields of Finland
So, who would have been best assigned to keeping the FGU busy?
That is good, editing that.
Heh.I was fondly hoping we could score a kill on Flowing Guard Unbreakable as a stretch goal. So I pointed an SSR-tier ace at them and pulled the Trigger.
That is true.
I'll sign it off, we need to be as prepared as possible next time the diplomats come knocking.
Why exactly are you against it? 4-man squads are standard in aerial combat, working in two pairs. That's when they're most effective and you can easily pull away a battle pair if needed. I can remove it and we can establish it later, but I'd like to hear some reasoning first.
Also, added a new question to Pulford in my plan: --[] What the hell is going on at Grunder?
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- Location
- Mid-Atlantic
1) As of right now we have 16 going on 20 or so serviceable fighters. Thinking back to the recent battle, if we organized all our aircraft into 4-man squadrons, this would represent a cap on the number of orders we could reasonably issue to different units and carry out simultaneously.
2) It's entirely possible that in our next engagement we will literally need to order six or more things done simultaneously. Including things that are best performed by, say, "Mobius One and his wingman," for which purpose assigning Mobius One a couple of extra wingmen would be redundant.
3) This observation ties into another, which is that in the presence of so many super-aces who are heavy weapons in their own right, there is rather less need to deploy them in squadron strength against the enemy. While "Rigel 1 and 2" might not constitute a viable tactical element alone by themselves under most circumstances, "Mobius 1 and Mobius 2" very much does.
4) Furthermore and related to (3), Strangereal conventions regarding aircraft munition supplies seem to apply in this setting, meaning that pairs of aircraft can put out sustained fire and maintain combat presence for much longer. This, too, increases the ability of a pair to be adequate; we can issue orders to "the Galm Team" that, even with absurdly skillful pilots, wouldn't work out in real life because they'd run out of missiles.
Now, when we have a larger number of planes- say, 28 or so- I'm going to be fine with this. We're not quite, quite there yet.
And I'm fine with regrouping squadron formations towards the eventual goal of uniform four-ship formations. For instance, folding Rigel 1 and Rigel 2 into Salamander Team and making it a four-ship squadron would seem advisable, with the sole caveat that we probably ought to revamp Rigel Squadron as an Su-33-EML unit in the near future, just so that we have one for ship-busting duties, whereas we may not want to re-equip Salamander Team with that particular plane/weapon combo.
Am I making sense?
Good idea.
Oh, a thought: some day we really need to call up Blaze and say "So, what really happened during the Continental War?" Maybe not this turn, but soon.
Siblinghood of Usean Vengeance (?)
- Location
- Meycauayan, Bulacan, Philippines
@huhYeahGoodPoint, so here's an omake. Because you said 'try to earn the numbers' earlier.
Introducing...
=================================================================================================
Cursed are the Eruseans, for all they taken from us.
"Imagine a war. Where the frontlines aren't an ephemeral 'over there' but are where ever an Erusean or Belkan or Osean lives on this planet," a bespectacled man, dressed in the clothes of an office worker started telling the wary guards at the gates of X-COM Usea's Selatapura Air Command in the middle of the night, while at the same time he laid beside him a rectangular crate with a visibly unlocked hasp latch.
Cursed are the Belkans, for their gifts of science to Erusea.
"Imagine a war. Where the combatants are hidden inside your populace, waiting to strike and hide repeatedly until they die," the man continued, as the guards had all started aiming their guns at the ranting office worker that was looking less and less like an office worker with every word he spouts.
Cursed are the Oseans, for their gifts of casus belli to Erusea and the traitors.
"Imagine a war! Fought not with tanks and planes and pretentious super weapons, but with fires and knives, trucks and cars, poisons and crossbows!" the man started to shout, so the guards who are backing away from the man can hear him, as well as the other guards who are running towards the gate from all directions.
Cursed are our militaries, for being the womb of traitors before the fist from the dark sky fell on Usea.
"Imagine a war! Where the objectives are a school, a market, a shopping mall! A village, a factory, or a water treatment plant!" the man shouted as soldiers surrounded him at a distance, yelling at him to raise his arms
Cursed be the arms companies, for their gifts of weapons.
"Imagine all that...but with limitless amounts of gunpowder and poison and pistols!"
Loosen your gnashing teeth siblings! The hour of vengeance has come.
"I am Lee Huo Yao, of the Selatapuran cell of the Siblinghood of Usean Vengeance! Here by collective vote of said cell to negotiate our surrender to X-COM! For the low, low demand of the internationally recognized independence of Selatapura sometime in the next two years!
With the help of the Lords of the dark sky.
"And as a gift, we offer you the secret of how the aliens are helping the Siblinghood arm itself without need for money or factory!"
Lee Huo Yao gently tipped over the cover of the wooden box, to reveal stacks of pistols and fully loaded magazines, and bottle upon bottle filled with black powder and nails.
===============================================================================================
...the Siblinghood of Usean Vengeance, an umbrella group composed of various smaller, angry groups. Nationalists of countries conquered by Erusea, revenge minded orphans and widows and widowers of the wars of the Usean continent, those who had been left homeless and jobless and perennially hungry ever since Ulysses fell, radicalized anarchists and anti-fascists, who have disagreements on every other target bar one.
Erusea...Erusea must bleed by their hands, and it must howl when it does bleed.
So...basically the idea is 'Thanks Erusea. You created Strangereal Al Qaeda. And the aliens are helping them with portable molecular assemblers.'
What do you think of this attempt at creating an Usean EXALT analogue?
Introducing...
=================================================================================================
Cursed are the Eruseans, for all they taken from us.
"Imagine a war. Where the frontlines aren't an ephemeral 'over there' but are where ever an Erusean or Belkan or Osean lives on this planet," a bespectacled man, dressed in the clothes of an office worker started telling the wary guards at the gates of X-COM Usea's Selatapura Air Command in the middle of the night, while at the same time he laid beside him a rectangular crate with a visibly unlocked hasp latch.
Cursed are the Belkans, for their gifts of science to Erusea.
"Imagine a war. Where the combatants are hidden inside your populace, waiting to strike and hide repeatedly until they die," the man continued, as the guards had all started aiming their guns at the ranting office worker that was looking less and less like an office worker with every word he spouts.
Cursed are the Oseans, for their gifts of casus belli to Erusea and the traitors.
"Imagine a war! Fought not with tanks and planes and pretentious super weapons, but with fires and knives, trucks and cars, poisons and crossbows!" the man started to shout, so the guards who are backing away from the man can hear him, as well as the other guards who are running towards the gate from all directions.
Cursed are our militaries, for being the womb of traitors before the fist from the dark sky fell on Usea.
"Imagine a war! Where the objectives are a school, a market, a shopping mall! A village, a factory, or a water treatment plant!" the man shouted as soldiers surrounded him at a distance, yelling at him to raise his arms
Cursed be the arms companies, for their gifts of weapons.
"Imagine all that...but with limitless amounts of gunpowder and poison and pistols!"
Loosen your gnashing teeth siblings! The hour of vengeance has come.
"I am Lee Huo Yao, of the Selatapuran cell of the Siblinghood of Usean Vengeance! Here by collective vote of said cell to negotiate our surrender to X-COM! For the low, low demand of the internationally recognized independence of Selatapura sometime in the next two years!
With the help of the Lords of the dark sky.
"And as a gift, we offer you the secret of how the aliens are helping the Siblinghood arm itself without need for money or factory!"
Lee Huo Yao gently tipped over the cover of the wooden box, to reveal stacks of pistols and fully loaded magazines, and bottle upon bottle filled with black powder and nails.
===============================================================================================
...the Siblinghood of Usean Vengeance, an umbrella group composed of various smaller, angry groups. Nationalists of countries conquered by Erusea, revenge minded orphans and widows and widowers of the wars of the Usean continent, those who had been left homeless and jobless and perennially hungry ever since Ulysses fell, radicalized anarchists and anti-fascists, who have disagreements on every other target bar one.
Erusea...Erusea must bleed by their hands, and it must howl when it does bleed.
So...basically the idea is 'Thanks Erusea. You created Strangereal Al Qaeda. And the aliens are helping them with portable molecular assemblers.'
What do you think of this attempt at creating an Usean EXALT analogue?
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Icipall
Don't worry, we can fanfix that!
- Location
- Cold snow fields of Finland
There's Chandelier in Estovakia and, unfortunately, Excalibur in Belka.
Yeah, I get what you're saying. How about I change it to start making our squads with no one above S-tier into proper 4-man squadrons? Getting Rigel and Salamander back to full strength, even if they're merged, as well as our newbies prepared was what I mostly wanted from it.
- Location
- Meycauayan, Bulacan, Philippines
There's also the possibility of more Scinfaxi-class Submarines in the Yuktobanian Navy at present.
I mean...Ballistic Missile Submarines still count as a superweapon, right?
@huhYeahGoodPoint, is the Yuktobanian Navy still operating Scinfaxi class submarines?
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- Location
- Austria
oh shit excalibur. Although....Elcero is already in that XCOM. So that one should probably be counted as dealt with
- Location
- Meycauayan, Bulacan, Philippines
oh shit excalibur. Although....Elcero is already in that XCOM. So that one should probably be counted as dealt with
Uhm, no. Cipher is still employed as a mercenary of Nordlands.
- Location
- Austria
oh
nevermind then?
- Location
- Somewhere over the rainbow
Bad news, everyone: my power got knocked out last night, and my computer is just about dead. I don't think I'll be able to type something out on my computer today, so don't expect anything more substantial than short responses today.
For this, you receive two pieces of information:
- The Siblinghood of Usean Vengeance cannot exist because...
- The Gunther Bay Emergency Administration was formed around the city of Selatapura, frankly so that world governments could pretend that they were giving aid to a coherent state. The Gunther Bay Emergency Administration's administrative region kept creeping up the Gunther Bay because no one else was administrating the area and joining the Gunther Bay Emergency Administration meant that you got some measure of aid instead of getting a rifle and being told to kill the traitors to Erusea.
Not currently. Scinfaxi-class submarines are an enormous investment that Yuktobania has no reason to create in times of relative peace and prosperity.
- Location
- Mid-Atlantic
Although given that Excalibur is a kilometer-high tower that... slumped... I'd honestly be surprised if "Tauberg's sword" hasn't completely crashed to the ground as a wreck in the time since.
I like the idea. But I'd say "no one above SS-tier." Basically, you need the four-ship formation to concentrate your strength unless you're either protagonist-tier, or "rusty-protagonist" tier like Blaze was when he signed up.
S-tier aces like Fat Man still work well as four-ship squadron leads. I mean, SSR-tier aces like Blaze (now) and Trigger do too, it's just that you don't need the flexibility as much at their level.
Icipall
Don't worry, we can fanfix that!
- Location
- Cold snow fields of Finland