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Petals of Carbon Steel -- You're a Pilot, Not an Ace. Try your best.

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[X] You determine the enemy's angle of approach beforehand

EDIT

Welcome back, I miss the casts' dynamic and natural wariness/suspicion towards Kana
 
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[X] You determine the enemy's angle of approach beforehand

This lets us plan better. I prefer the odds when we have at least a sliver of an idea of what we'll do.
 
[X] You determine the enemy's angle of approach beforehand

Either this or no technical glitches, but we do have an allied stealth ship on hand. If we know where the threat is coming from, they can maneuver to shove something very destructive up their exhaust pipe at an inopportune moment (for the baddies.)
 
[X] You determine the enemy's angle of approach beforehand

Guh, I don't like any of these not happening for us, but I guess knowing what they're doing ahead of time is the better choice.
 
[X] You determine the enemy's angle of approach beforehand

Obviously you don't want your gear breaking on you in the middle of a fight. But knowing what your enemy will do before they do it? It's like the Holy Grail of tactical situations.
 
[X] The civilian population is kept calm and orderly, even in the event of emergency lockdowns or evacuations
 
Gazetteer said:
Which means, even if we find a pilot who can actually use this thing to its full potential, well, congrats, they'll probably be the only one who can use it, after a combat or two. And none of this is reliable enough for mass production. Waste of people, waste of resources, waste of time.
​
What? No, obviously I'm not going to tell this to anyone who matters. I'd end up shuffled off to somewhere worse, and nothing would change. I'm just griping. Hand me that multi-tool, will you?​
​
— Engineer working on the development of the QDIMX Carbon Steel​
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Ah, the glory of pet projects backed by Important People who can't be bothered to listen to the engineers. Or the cost-benefit analysis.

The "best" part is that I think their solution to creating such an overcomplicated monstrosity was not to scrap it and start over, but to conduct medical experiments to engineer pilots who could fly it.

Gazetteer said:
"Tham, I need you desperately," you say into your comm as the lift slowly takes you out to the hab ring. Effective gravity slowly increases bit by bit as you're carried down the shaft that connects it to the spaceport.

There's a momentary pause before Jay responds. "From another woman, that might sound more promising," he says. "What's on fire?"

You feel an intense swell of relief and affection -- you'd probably have kissed him if you'd been in the same room. You refuse to gush, however. "I'm going to Booker — she doesn't... hate me these days, I think. But you'll help me be more convincing about all this, so I'm taking you with me. There have to be some perks to our arrangement, right?"

"It's so romantic when you talk about our relationship that way," he says. "Where are we meeting?"

"Oh, we're bothering her on her day off," you say. "Now I just feel like a jerk."

Jay snorts. "That is your favourite feeling in the world."

"Normally, yes. But I'm trying to be serious today," you say. "The goal is to not wind her up, for once."

"Well, I can see why you brought help, then," Jay says.

"She has a point," Jay says. He gives your shoulder a little squeeze that you pretend isn't as reassuring as it is.

You scoff. "Well, good thing you both won't have to get used to it anytime soon."
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The quality I admire most about your writing is the small things. Distinctive voices and small interactions that made your characters feel real. Plenty of authors can handle dramatic events, but far fewer can manage small talk.

Gazetteer said:
"That we know of," Salimus says. Out of the corner of her eye, Edith can see him running a hand down his face. He looks like an older and far less carefree man than he did at the start of this voyage — maybe that's why Edith can stand being in a compartment with him now. "They took her and the Carbon Steel intact."

"That's all the more reason to get her out before they can force her to do anything they can use," Edith says. "The technology is what Command cares about, anyway."

Salimus is quiet for a long, uncomfortable moment. "And the girl?"

Edith takes in a deep breath, and lets it out forcefully, flicking the stylus up and away from her. It spins wildly through space, drifting to ricochet off the ceiling, forcing Salimus to dodge out of the way. "Well, we're the only ones who are going to give a shit about her, beyond the way she's useful. So, we'll just have to do what we can. We're the ones who threw that girl into battle, completely unprepared, because we needed her. She's our responsibility."

Salimus gives a sigh in response, which Edith takes for agreement. What else can there be, to something like that? The man can be insufferable, but he's reliable where it counts.
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I always enjoy it when the soldiers of Space North Korea show actual human decency. It shows how much of the awfulness takes place because they're constantly performing for each other, demonstrating their resolve and loyalty to His Divine Majesty. In private, with someone she trusts, Captain Kron is very different now that she was in her first appearance.

Of course, the incentives for being terrible people haven't changed, but it's still nice to be reminded that human compassion still exists in the Divine Empire.
 
[x] The civilian population is kept calm and orderly, even in the event of emergency lockdowns or evacuations
 
Duke of Pretzels said:
[x] There are no surprise technical problems at inconvenient times

The ability to react to the plan is vital to keeping our limited supply of people safe
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Ever heard the tale of Prometheus? Forsightbis better than Hindsight. Being able to plan ahead and position our resources for maximum effectiveness is more important than preventing a few pieces of tech from failing on us. We have a ship with cloaking prime for an ambush. We have a planets worth of military assets that will otherwise be too widely spread out covering multiple approaches to leverage the advantage of numbers, unless we know where they are coming from. If we know what direction there coming from we can simply evacuate area's facing the conflict zone rather than having to do a planet wide evacuation. It's the all around strategically better option, because it's a strategy option rather than a tech or none combat one.
 
[X] There are no surprise technical problems at inconvenient times

The clear implication is that by voting this, we might get surprise technical problems at convenient times.

That sounds nice. I'd like to see that.
 
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