LostDeviljho
Flame Dragon Princess
- Location
- The glorious Pacific Northwest
- Pronouns
- Any
What happens when we get +10 to our science rolls? Do we just auto-succeed everything but the esoterics?
Tacit Ronin vs. The World II: KRAUN Jewels
- Thread starter Fyrstorm
- Start date
KnightDisciple
Brotherhood. Unity. Peace.
- Location
- Midwest, USA
Rolls probably determine how successful various actions are. Bigger and more interesting actions will have a range of success, whereas more "mundane" stuff might just auto-succeed (which is fine; I don't mind not rolling for minor upgrades or whatnot).
I figured that our Research level is, by and large, a bonus on top of whatever we roll. A Nat 10 and Nat 1 trump everything, but when we have a level 1 Research, our research capabilities max out at about 10/11; compared to having level 10 Research where our capabilities max out at around 19/20.
Way I figure it, it means we're able to get higher research rolls in general in order to have a better chance at passing difficulty checks in general; we can pull off higher levels of research without requiring hope of getting a Nat 10, and even on the simpler research items we could achieve easily even at level 1 we're able to get better bonuses off those successes.
I imagine we'd still roll even if we have de-facto auto success, both to account for the possibility of a Nat 1 and Nat 10 and to see just how spectacularly we got over the level required for success.
Imagine we wanted to research, for some silly reason, better cafeteria food. Something we could likely get easily with even a Level 1 Research Level; and something we probably get de-facto success on at Level 10. The trick is we still have to worry about Nat 1s (you accidentally destroy the cafeteria trying to install better cooking machines) and might get Nat 10s (you have the best cafeteria in the history of military cafeterias; you could become cafeteria tycoons with your cafeteria upgrades if the world wasn't all f
ed over), but compare what we'd get from a 9 roll for 10 total to what we'd get from a 9 roll for 19 total.
Week 32: Downtime
Fyrstorm
Gun Waifu Extraordinaire
- Location
- 'Straya
- Pronouns
- He/Him
The week starts off with a whole lot of research.
First up is the continuation of work on the BRFS system, in an attempt to develop a version to replace Tacit's fangblades. Based off of the newer falchion design, the so-called "Fracture Blades" are a lot longer and more angular than the jaeger's original swords, each ending in a metal tip, with the emitters along the cutting edge. Due to needing a hard connection, the Fracture Blades can't run on the same rail deployment system of the old ones-- instead, they mount on hinges that attach behind the wrist, allowing them to swing forwards for combat.* The only real downside is how much power the weapons draw, making them incompatible with the jaeger's current reactor.
New Jaeger Weapon Available for Purchase: BRFS-04-F Fracture Blade!
BRFS-04-F Fracture Blade
2300 Resources
Built-in Melee Weapon
Attack Dice: 1d10 (pairs)
Parry Dice: 1d5+1
Block Dice: 1d5
Armour Penetration: Ignores Armour
Grappling Bonus: -3
Durability: 8
Damage Type: Burst
Damage Bonus: Strength
Special:
Fracture Blades may only be used by Mark IV+ Jaegers.
Cauterises Wounds
Obviously, I will have means in place to make sure you don't hilariously abuse this.
In a bid to boost Neo-Seattle's other Jaeger some more, J-tech sets to work on a series of maneuverability upgrades for Jagdhund. The jaeger's servos aren't in any major need of improvement, so instead a few sections of her internal frame are replaced with lighter ones, lessening the overall load on her joints. Additionally, her gyroscopes are given a thorough check, and have their older parts replaced with new, lighter components as well.
18 successes! Jagdhund to Agility 3! 17/20 reactor points in use! 0/20 to Agility 4!
Next is another continuation of research, as Breach Tech attempts to deal with the radiation problem of their current prototype. There's a few suggestions, but the best solution seems to be in modifying the nature of the stabilisers themselves.
The experiments are a success-- by increasing the output and introducing an electromagnetic "lightning rod", an artificial Breach would have its internal radiation suppressed to safe levels. All that's left is stabilising it, and actually giving it a proper "receiver" to link to.
Difficulty reduced greatly. More research needed.
Meanwhile, communications are ongoing with Medford, in an attempt to get them to allow Neo-Seattle to rest at their city during a future excursion to Oblivion Bay. Needless to say, it's a little tenser than people would prefer it to be.
The end result is inconclusive. It's gonna take a lot more than just one week to convince these people to cooperate on this.
The recycling facility continues to get rid of old, unneeded armour.
-1 Steel Body Plating, -8 Solid Iron Armour!
+662 Resources!
Lots of aircraft are being built.
2 Resupply Squadrons constructed!
1 Condor Squadron constructed!
2 Banshee Squadrons constructed!
And Doctor Sturm's request is looked into. Admittedly, it's not much, but Team Magic is allowed a more dedicated lab to work in.
Failure. Minor reduction to Magic research difficulty.
Civilians quickly notice the new additions to the refurbished Space Needle-- a set of large, gilded fins around its upper spire, and some bulky box shapes below the disc. It's not long before the new transmitter is finished, and Jagdhund quickly confirms that she's able to communicate with it.
ANGEL-Net Transmitter constructed!
The Breach Buster project goes swimmingly, and finally yields hard results! The new delivery vessel, designated the Anti-Breach Warhead Carrier 1, is capable of containing most standard warheads, and incorporates synthetic kaiju parts based off of Palisade's genome. An internal battery allows the false nerves to appear alive, and fool the gate into letting it through, while a hydrodynamic capsule provides some protection.
New Miscellaneous: ABWC-1 Wormhole Penetrator!
ABWC-1 Wormhole Penetrator
3000 Resources
May hold one warhead of up to 5 dice worth. When used against a Precursor Breach, roll 1d10-- on a 5+, the attack penetrates, and affects the Breach directly. Otherwise, the attack deflects. Either way, the Wormhole Penetrator is destroyed as soon as the attack is resolved.
A Wormhole Penetrator can only be carried by a Jaeger or Jumphawk.
Engineering sets to work on an interesting project-- a conventional unit designed to mount the new Barrier system to defend other conventionals.
The problem is-- the Barrier just takes far too much power for anything short of a nuclear reactor to sustain for long. Batteries could potentially be used, but they'd run themselves flat after a few minutes.
You have two routes to take:
[ ] Nuclear (constant shield, greater capacity, expensive, superheavy)
[ ] Battery (temporary shield, lower capacity, cheaper, not set as superheavy or conventional)
Choosing one route will reduce the difficulty in researching it.
Attempts at replicating the storage system shown by Ascalon could have gone much better. As it stands, they do return with a functional prototype-- a barely functional one. Further refinement will be needed, though the principle is sound. The system consists of an enclosed Breach 'bubble', synchronised with a unit and held shut and stable until the unit needs to withdraw something. It'd probably work better with the incorporation of the "Breachgate" tech currently in the works, as otherwise the contraption couldn't move (since the storage system draws far too much power-- a noted concern among more of the fancy new things these days)
Research needed for the following:
- Breach bubble stabiliser
- Mobile pocket entry point
- Greater power efficiency
- Distance link
After this is successful, the final system can be completed.
I'll be honest, the Breach Storage thing is a lot harder to mechanically implement and to research in-game than flying is.
Similarly, the results of replicating the Cat V's flight are a little mixed. While the atomic engine prevents the need for much in the way of fuel (as long as it's operating in a fluid medium), it's incredibly energy intensive. The only power source capable of fueling such a monstrosity would be something like Striker Eureka's Supercell-- which is in Australia. Not to mention it's really damn expensive.
Ignoring the power issues, the flight system should work pretty well. The actual equipment consists of three main parts, which mount on the back and thighs. The upper back unit consists of the main forwards thrusters, a smaller set of engine pods, and two mobile aerofoils for control; while each thigh pack mounts another maneuvering fin and a set of articulated engine clusters.
New Jaeger Augment: Allegorica Flight Unit!
Allegorica Flight Unit
20 000 Resources
The jaeger gains the "Aerial Ace" and "Atomic Engine" traits, allowing it to fly under its own power. However, the jaeger automatically crashes if it suffers a Major+ Wound to the associated locations.
The Allegorica Flight Unit requires 2 Augment slots to function.
- Aerial Ace: The jaeger can fly under its own power, and follows the rules for Flying characters when doing so.
-- Can take off as a move action or as a two point advantage move provided its durability limit has not been exceeded. When airborne, double Agility. Can not be charged while flying and melee attacks can not be made against this character. Ranged attacks are at +1 difficulty to hit the target if it moves while flying though a hit may knock the creature out of control. Each time a flying character takes a strike while flying, take a toughness test (6). If the test is passed, they keep control, if failed, they immediately crash 1d5 units away in a random direction and takes 1d10 blunt damage. If they would land on something, both characters take 2d10 blunt damage, knocked prone and immediately locked in a grapple.
-- Atomic Engine: The jaeger treats its durability as +6 higher for the purposes of taking off/flying. Once a battle, the jaeger may initiate a Charge immediately after a move action.
Equips to Spine, Pelvis, and Thighs.
May only be used by Mark V Jaegers.
Similarly, I will have stuff in place so you don't abuse this. Like, you know, endurance limits and pilot fatigue.
The Barrier system is the subject of another team as well-- this one focused on making it safer to use.
That's easier said than done. Engineering does manage to lessen the damage to surrounding components through some additional redundancies in the shield itself, but the backlash is something that's a bit tougher to deal with. The resulting variant is a little safer, and a little more expensive.
Variant: EXB-02S Variable Barrier Shield
2300 Resources
As above (for EXB-02), except for the following:
If the shield collapses, roll on the Vitals Damage Table.
J-tech refuses to abandon the stellarator as is, and continues trying to improve it. Examination of the design suggests that some of the bulky parts could be replaced by smaller ones of Jagdarium**-- the superalloy now used in much of the jaegers' armour and newer frame parts-- resulting in an overall gain in cost efficiency. Meanwhile, a series of external "fuses" are deemed a viable possibility, burning out to reduce a lot of the extra damage an electrical attack could cause.
Helios Heavy Fusion Stellarator costs 50 000 Resources! Gained: Burnout Fuses!
- Burnout Fuses: Ignores the effects of Unshielded for the first Electrical attack suffered.
Along with this massive focus on research comes more investment into the equipment itself, and the sciences profit greatly for it.
Research to 10!
And that's the week.***
*Think of them like the Astraea's Proto GN Sword, except with the typical "laser chainsaw" appearance on the edges.
**Finally came up with a special name for it. Yakk-tehr-iyum. Rolls off the tongue nicely.
***Kaiju come later. Fyr is tire. eeeeurrgh.
KnightDisciple
Brotherhood. Unity. Peace.
- Location
- Midwest, USA
Serious suggestion for Medford:
-Send them a lot of conventionals, some supplies to get them going on their own Shatterdome, and 1-2 Jaegers. Alternatively, when we get stable Breachgates, set them up with a Gate so that we can send forces to them.
-When we start salvaging Jaegers, task 1-2 to specifically defend Medford.
Honestly I don't see them settling for anything that doesn't do whatever it can to guarantee their safety, and quite frankly that means 1 or more Jaegers.
-Send them a lot of conventionals, some supplies to get them going on their own Shatterdome, and 1-2 Jaegers. Alternatively, when we get stable Breachgates, set them up with a Gate so that we can send forces to them.
-When we start salvaging Jaegers, task 1-2 to specifically defend Medford.
Honestly I don't see them settling for anything that doesn't do whatever it can to guarantee their safety, and quite frankly that means 1 or more Jaegers.
Highwind
To Rise From The Ashes
- Location
- Brazil
That's a lovely weapon. We're finally close to the Super Robot big leagues, fellows.
See what I'm talking about? We're close to getting a fancy, complicated transport system...
Slightly closer to getting actual magic to incorporate into the Robots and their equipment...
We're this close to getting a Mercurius style defensive unit, and we all know that between the energy field robots, the transforming main Gundam, the edgy scythe wielding one, all the super prototypes and the red sword wielding gundam that transforms into a dragon, Gundam Wing was a Super Robot series disguised as Real Robot.
By the way, I'm leaning towards getting the conventional variant so we can deploy them faster. We're reaching a point where the only way to get what we need to build the good stuff is by hunting more Kaiju, and we have lots of expensive things to build.
On the other hand the big reason the superheavy version is so big and expensive is the reactor, just like the Heimdal, so I'm hoping they're on the same price range and well within budget.
Here's our guide to getting viable Hamerspace, and while I'm tempted to research all of them at once next downtime, I propose we do just two of them and invest a few actions towards hunting Kaiju. We do need the money, both for the Stellarator and the new Jaeger, plus all the other toys.
In my opinion, stronger Jaegers are a priority above everything else but building a new Jaeger for the team, and we're what, thirty thousand RU away from a new Mark III?
.
Oh hell yes, that's perfect. Sad we have to wait until Mark V, but I'm so happy to already have this. The design doesn't have many flaws besides the need for two augment slots and we'll have plenty of time to refine it until we can use it.
If we can get to keep the GAPAS while equipping this we can probably dodge just about anything they fire at us unless it's a range-specialized Kaiju, considering we'd have a +10 dodge bonus.
It's so good the only reason I'm not giggling with glee is because I'm saving my laughter for when we actually equip it and you can bet I'll push for more Jaeger upgrades so we can get to use it sooner.
[X] Nuclear (constant shield, greater capacity, expensive, superheavy)
LostDeviljho
Flame Dragon Princess
- Location
- The glorious Pacific Northwest
- Pronouns
- Any
[X] Nuclear (constant shield, greater capacity, expensive, superheavy)
KnightDisciple
Brotherhood. Unity. Peace.
- Location
- Midwest, USA
[X] Nuclear (constant shield, greater capacity, expensive, superheavy)
Fyrstorm
Gun Waifu Extraordinaire
- Location
- 'Straya
- Pronouns
- He/Him
This could also be used as an emergency evacuation method, now that you don't have to worry about boiling them with Cherenkov radiation.
Don't forget that you have a fancy name for your op super alloy as well!
Honestly, the conventional version would probably operate like a team of Planet Defensors, with a bunch of projectors as seperate units in the squad.
I honestly was always planning on the "needs two aug slots" thing from the start, just because of how useful flight would be.
And yes, you can keep all your augments-- as long as Tacit doesn't take any more. However, I'm not as sure about Jagdhund, due to her very cluttered back.
Edit:... Nah, I'll wait a bit longer before locking it in.
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Highwind
To Rise From The Ashes
- Location
- Brazil
My idea of refining it was reducing the cost, or maybe seeing if we can integrate other tech we research to make it better, like the Hammerspace or Magic, or something else.
Plus, we don't even have the Mini-Mecha yet and we're already about halfway to upgrading from GMs/Jestas to ReZELs without transformations.
Well, there's always hammerspace. If we can equip her with it then we might be able to open up some space there.
But even then, there'll probably be other augments that would benefit Jagdhund more than flight. Tacit's build works very well with flight, while Jagdhund's doesn't work quite as well. She'd benefit from the barrier shield, I think. Or from a Funnel system.
HolyDragoon
Call Gespenst!
- Location
- Portugal
Fyrstorm
Gun Waifu Extraordinaire
- Location
- 'Straya
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Actually, I was referencing Evangelion ANIMA, and Eva-02 Allegorica.
Kinda like this, but in the jaeger version there's a booster pod on either hip instead of the crazy centaur back parts. Maybe more like the EURO II Heurtebize.
HolyDragoon
Call Gespenst!
- Location
- Portugal
Oh, that one. Forgot ANIMA was a thing, tbh.
KnightDisciple
Brotherhood. Unity. Peace.
- Location
- Midwest, USA
Fyrstorm
Gun Waifu Extraordinaire
- Location
- 'Straya
- Pronouns
- He/Him
The latter.
- Location
- madison
well at least we are going to get a real good look at the truck that about to hit us.
Fyrstorm
Gun Waifu Extraordinaire
- Location
- 'Straya
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Truck? Hah!
This is no truck. This is a rocket.
Upon the data's return, the scanning crew is thrown into a state of worry-- for there's a few things that are uncomfortably similar to the kaiju that attacked just a month ago.
It's very fast. It's incredibly radioactive. And its body plan?
Four legs. Two wings. One tail. A sleek, armoured silhouette. No lingering Breach radiation, but a low level electrical field and a more extensive spread of radioactivity through its body.
Were it not for its smaller size and the other minor differences, they'd swear it's another Ascalon.
SE-26-049 "Danslief" is 60 km south of the city. It will reach you in about 16 minutes.
How do you deploy?
*Evil GM laughter*
[X] Nuclear
If I may make a suggestion on our 'primary' power core situation - I think that, with as expensive as the primary power cores are getting at this point, it may be time to just go for broke and advance to researching a Jaeger Power Core that can power both Mk V and Mk IV Jaegers. That way, once we get that to a reasonably low price, we can effectively be done with it rather than spend what's effectively the cost of an entirely new Jaeger not once, but twice.
I think a mix of a Breachgate and some cons are probably our best option when it comes to Medford.
I was considering something along the same lines. Maybe not as a go-to plan, but we should definitely be considering the Breachgate's options as an emergency evacuation system, including for Neo-Seattle.
Once we get a Breachgate set up in Neo-Seattle, we may want to look at long-term emergency planning, including potentially considering what happens should we run up against something that's more than we can handle. With a system like this in place, we potentially have the option to be able to evacuate Neo-Seattle itself should we run into a worst-case scenario, and we may want to consider looking into researching better emergency bunkers so that, should Neo Seattle loose all it's Jaegers and we're not able to evacuate everyone, we give the citizens a better place to hide for several weeks or several months until - hopefully - KRUAN or another group is able to launch a rescue mission to recover anyone who's still alive.
Well, you know how the last fight against Ascalon went, and he was Category V.
I hope Jagdhund is ready for a repeat beatdown performance.
If I may make a suggestion on our 'primary' power core situation - I think that, with as expensive as the primary power cores are getting at this point, it may be time to just go for broke and advance to researching a Jaeger Power Core that can power both Mk V and Mk IV Jaegers. That way, once we get that to a reasonably low price, we can effectively be done with it rather than spend what's effectively the cost of an entirely new Jaeger not once, but twice.
I think a mix of a Breachgate and some cons are probably our best option when it comes to Medford.
I was considering something along the same lines. Maybe not as a go-to plan, but we should definitely be considering the Breachgate's options as an emergency evacuation system, including for Neo-Seattle.
Once we get a Breachgate set up in Neo-Seattle, we may want to look at long-term emergency planning, including potentially considering what happens should we run up against something that's more than we can handle. With a system like this in place, we potentially have the option to be able to evacuate Neo-Seattle itself should we run into a worst-case scenario, and we may want to consider looking into researching better emergency bunkers so that, should Neo Seattle loose all it's Jaegers and we're not able to evacuate everyone, we give the citizens a better place to hide for several weeks or several months until - hopefully - KRUAN or another group is able to launch a rescue mission to recover anyone who's still alive.
Well, you know how the last fight against Ascalon went, and he was Category V.
I hope Jagdhund is ready for a repeat beatdown performance.
