- Location
- Back in Cali
Yes because we have been improving relations with the stronger one and are influencing the other. This war is likely to bind us closer together a triple alliance for whatever comes in the future.
Who Needs Harmony?: An MLP Empire Quest
- Thread starter Questor
- Start date
- Location
- California
I think camo might be better for Captain Kaboom. At least that way he has an easier chance to hide, and a coat for the winter.
If sombra dose not attack this turn, It won't be useless. We will have the weapons, and an action free to do other stuff next turn. By your own analysis, there is not action as important that dose not already have a slot free in it's relavent category, so no excuse there. as for if he attacks, the weapons can instantly free thralls under his control, and likely be extremely Lethal to his magical creations. so plenty of advantage there. And secreacy.. that's already out the window. We already used the metal in sombras own territory to free hundreds of citizens. while he likely dose not know the exact details, he very likely suspects something along those lines.
- Location
- A house
Ah, I'm not worried about it passing too much, since I plan to toss omakes at it myself, which is why I'd rather save that option for later. Would like to have some nitro now so that, when the explosion does go off itd have a greater effect
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- Location
- Back in Cali
Nitro is extremely unstable that is more than likely to add another hazard roll if we leave it sitting until we invade.
- Location
- A house
Were not using pure nitro though. Were using gelignite or dynamite, it seems. Much safer to work with. Even specifically says more stable.
- Location
- Back in Cali
Except it degrades and in a frozen and snow-covered area it is likely to degrade even faster than normal. To keep our selves safe we should keep as little time between making it and using it.
- Location
- Maryland
The Cold Fluffy White Bullshit Action is all three of your mages running around the Empire creating, charging and maintaining the runes. If you assign them to that, they won't be able to do anything else.
Yes, once you choose to invade, you automatically call your allies.
At the present time, those advisors are the only ones you could convince to move to Gryphus and work for you. Perhaps later that may change, but not right now.
Also, it's not as though the Yaks and the Neighponese will never talk to each other if you don't introduce them to each other. This just sets it up immediately on your terms, building the groundwork for future relationships and hopefully ensuring a good relationship between all three of you.
Unless the QM says otherwise I'm just going to assume it will be fine.
- Location
- Back in Cali
Which can be done after the war. Right now the meeting does nothing for us.
- Location
- Back in Cali
That is how it works in real life and we don't get told everything that happens with our actions. Not everything is straight forward but just to see how close to real life we are playing these unstable substances.
@Questor will the blasting jelly and nitro degrade like in real life when left exposed to the elements?
- Location
- sweden
Ok, genuine question here. How to we plan to do this war? I genuinely don't know if it is better to do a recruitment drive or to get cannons or flamethrowers. Remember, we depleted a LOT of sombra's flesh and blood soldiers. He can't have a large number of his knights. The main problem here will be his super heavies: the windegos and the crystal golems.
Now, I'm NOT saying that we shouldn't do it before the invasion. More bodies is more bodies. what I am saying is that right now it might be best to rush our artillery production. One canon can deal more damage to a stone behemoth than 100 infantry griffins can. Even if we have to face large infantry forces, we have grape shot now.
Our best strategy in my opinion would be to use the neighponese as windego hunters and then use cannons, ballistas and flamethrowers to deal with the golem behemoths. Technically, we don't want to kill the "normal soldiers" anyway.
I haven't taken much time to think this through but as I see it, here is how I would want to fight in broad strokes.
The main force: normal infantry and archers supported by flyers and all artillery. support to drop nets on the normal crystal infantry at a range to possibly preserve lives. Archers to prioritize the normal infantry that managed to get within charge distance of our infantry. Our infantry should focus on keeping themselves alive and holding to buy time and protections the artillery.
Heavy artillery: ballistas and cannons should focus on the golems. Most likely, each Behemoth will take several shots to take down. Best would be if each Cannon and ballista are grouped in groups of three with each group focusing on one behemoth to ensure they are felled as fast as possible.
Knights: we know only of two and a half way to kill the windegos. Fire, neighponese magic and possibly our mage-bane weapons. The knights should be tasked with plugging any weakness in the line, rapid response to defend the artillery teams and if need be engage the special units of our enemy with fire.
Lastly are strike forces. These should be made up of any specialized neighponese Hunter unit that can challenge the windegos and griffon units with firebombs. One last Strikeforce will of course have the king himself as the target. This kingslaying unit would naturally be all our hero units with mage-bane weapons and maybe some firebombs just to be sure to have a surprise.
- Location
- A house
Where are you pulling your info on nitro from anyway? As far as I know, dynamite just tends to get more unstable over time when stored in warmer temperatures due to nitro moving out of the casing and pooling underneath it or crystallizing on it. At least, as far as I recall.
- Location
- Maryland
I'm basing it on Gelignite, which, unlike Dynamite, doesn't sweat Nitroglycerin over time. I hadn't planned for it to degrade over time, no.
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- Location
- Back in Cali
It isn't only in hot areas. This is what is said about storing nitro and dynamite and that is under good conditions not the conditions that we will be leaving them in which is exposed to the elements and left for however long it takes for us to invade. We also have yet to develop the blasting caps.
The maximum shelf life of nitroglycerin-based dynamite is recommended as one year from the date of manufacture under good storage conditions.[6]
Over time, regardless of the sorbent used, sticks of dynamite will "weep" or "sweat" nitroglycerin, which can then pool in the bottom of the box or storage area. For that reason, explosive manuals recommend the repeated turning over of boxes of dynamite in storage. Crystals will form on the outside of the sticks causing them to be even more shock, friction, and temperature sensitive. This creates a very dangerous situation. While the risk of an explosion without the use of a blasting cap is minimal for fresh dynamite, old dynamite is dangerous. Modern packaging helps eliminate this by placing the dynamite into sealed plastic bags, and using wax coated cardboard.
Dynamite is moderately sensitive to shock. Shock resistance tests are usually carried out with a drop-hammer: about 100 mg of explosive is placed on an anvil, upon which a weight of between 0.5 and 10 kg is dropped from different heights until detonation is achieved.[8] With a hammer of 2 kg, mercury fulminate detonates with a drop distance of 1 to 2 cm, nitroglycerin with 4 to 5 cm, dynamite with 15 to 30 cm, and ammoniacal explosives with 40 to 50 cm.
Edit: well that answers that we still need to invent the blasting cap to make it work though.
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I disagree. I think Sombra should still have many hundreds of thousands of slave ponies left which he will throw at us if we invade him, even if they'll be equipped with mining tools and bare hooves because of his imploded war economy. Since they don't have morale to break, our army would be swamped, starved of ammo, then beaten by his elites.
The main problem is that we don't have the numbers to beat a nation that can conscript its entire population as utterly fearless cannon fodder on the attack. We need many times more soldiers than we have right now.
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- Location
- Italy
i disagree on two points
1) Sombra does not know HOW we freed the citizens. He might actually not even KNOW we freed them in the first place, depending on how the helmets work. He could reasonably assume they simply died of overwork, like many other did.
2)"the weapons can instantly free thralls under his control, and likely be extremely lethal to his magical creations" is wrong and/or unimportant.
first, we're making swords for 5 warriors (Garrick, his wife and the three grandmasters)and they're certainly not going to try free the ponies while in battle. That would insanely risky. They'll aim to kill because they have to, as even if they freed some they'd be simply distractions, and would probably be killed by the other slaves behind them. Also if/when they enter the battle it will be mostly to kill Sombra. I won't deny the swords will make them more likely to survive though.
second, we have no reason to believe oricalchum weapon would be the monsters' weakness, they simply disrupt active magic. Now there IS a chance they might be as effective as you say... which still matters little, as against his worst creation we'll mostly use our artillery. The only TRUE benefit we get from giving swords to our kind-of-hero units is that, if they face Sombra DIRECTLY they're a bit more likely to be able to kill him. Even that is not certain as we can't be sure even oricalchum swords will be able to hit him while he has no body, though at the very least they can be use to parry/deflect/negate some of his magical attacks.
not even these two and a half, sadly. Fire will weaken them somewhat, but they actually CAN'T be killed (according to Koryu) without starving them of the despair they feed on. And until we try our anti-magic weapons on them (of which we have ZERO now and FIVE if we take the sword action) we can't really be sure of how they'll work on ethereal beings (including BOTH Windigos and Sombra)
Now I'd leave the specific tactics as something to discuss once the battle turns start, but I'll say that more soldiers (and we can reasonably expect AT LEAST 10.000 from that action) are a priority compared to simply 10 more cannons or 4 more flamethrowers. Of course some plans are going to do both thanks to overtimes (see Adventwolf's one for example). Ah, and before i forget
We killed 100.000 soldiers. Problem is, he probably has hundreds of thousands more. Sombra's limit is more one of equipment that of people. We DID kill his shadow abominations, and if we're lucky he's short on umbrum essence, but normal soldiers he has quite a bit.
i think you're going a bit too micro. Mechanically speaking that action gives a bonus to demolition rolls. That's honestly enough for me to believe it will work. The info about how various explosives work is interesting though
- Location
- A house
Alright, thanks for the wikipedia entry. Doesnt say much on temperature though. In liquid form it swears out, in semi liquid it is highly volatile, and in solid form it goes back to being fine, although thawing it is highly dangerous. Should still work frozen, and the sweating problem is mitigated.
Cant quite go around sourcing it, since it was back in my high school chem class and my memory is pretty terrible, but I'm pretty sure I could find some sources if I dig around the internet a bit...
Anyway, since were working with gelignite, it doesnt particularly matter. That, and worrying about being 'realistic' in these quests on a micro scale is honestly not all that fun. Especially in a setting with magic.
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- Location
- Back in Cali
doesn't matter we are using the more stable version that cannot explode without a detonator.
- Location
- South Carolina
I think it is worth noting that we seemed to have only tested what the Orichalcum did when applied to the surface of someone's skin and when someone was close to a sample of the metal, and found that it did not effect internal passive magic abilities. It could be that when inserted into a subject (read: stabbed into someone), it would disrupt any sort of natural magical effects a subject might have, such as Sombra's smoke form and the etheral magic holding the Wendigos together.
- Location
- Reno Nv
You know, if we were able to get more anti magic for the swords, we could make a runefang expy.
- Location
- California
Hmm, I can see how fully immersing Orichalcum can have different effects, but testing this would be impossible until the day of the invasion since it would require stabbing a griff or really anyone.
- Location
- Back in Cali
Here is an updated version of the plan switch out firebender for stealth if we want to force Sombra to attack we need a way to provoke him better intrigue and possible raid actions from this might be what is needed.
Now that the main problem I had with the explosive research has been answered I am fine with switching out the second overtime action on that instead of more flamethrowers. We can build more flamethrowers next turn and do the firebender reserach for it as well.
[] Plan War Prep and Boom V3
Martial: 2 actions
[] The Peregrine Line-The Gates to the North (1) Locked
[] Army Artillery (1) 500
Diplomacy: 2 action
[] Steam Pump Exports (1) 50
[] Boom Tubes for the Dragon-Blooded (1) 0
Stewardship: 2 action
[] Settling the Western Frontier (1) Locked
[] Imperial Irrigation Program (1) Locked
Learning: 2 actions
[] Camouflage 101 (1) 200
[] Machine Tools (1) Locked
Intrigue: 1 action
[] Captain Karl Kaboom's Explosive Adventures (1) 40% 400
Personal: 2 action
[] Overtime: Recruitment Drives (1) 1500
[] Overtime: Blasting Jelly (1) 300
Treasury Reserves: 1240
Yearly Income: 5850
Yearly Expenditures: 540
Net Income: 5310
Cost: 5310-2950=2360
Net= 2260
Treasury= 3600
Right so all of our overtime and martial is to increase the Army's power as much as possible. If Questor says we can at least do both the flamethrower improvement and snow counteraction and we can start it with a personal action then one might be switched to that instead.
Diplomacy is all about improving relations and strengthing our more powerful ally. Right now the Yaks meeting doesn't help us as much as improving the fighting power and output of the Neignpon. Giving them weapons that improve their chance to stop the bigger force is a must.
Stewardship is all locked up and the farming increase should reverse quite a bit of the food problems we have right now. They are both large increases in income from taxes, but for the program and settlement at least it is new mining income, farming income, and lumber income as well. This is a whole new area that is full of potential growth.
Learning depends on Questors answers, for now, it is about improving our greatest weapons against the shadow beasts that Sombra uses. The Flamethrower might be stationary but the liquid fire itself is very mobile, and the firebombs, and moltovs all get the same boost.
Intrigue it is time to set things up whether or not we invade next turn getting that sabotage ready we be very important in keeping our people alive when we do invade.
All overtime goes to the army and military no other way around that we need the power boost.
With so many locked actions every plan will come in under budget and grow our treasury so we have something to use when the war starts. With the increase from the new income sources finishing up this turn next turn we can use up most if not all of it and still have enough for actions afterward. If we invade as well then it is okay to go into debt to make it as in our favor as possible.
Edit: Alright switching out the firebender for stealth research. Cost is the same and we can do the firebender on the same turn as a war if need be.
Edit 2: Switched out more flamers for the blasting jelly it is the safer version of the explosive that doesn't degrade like dynamite and won't explode without a blasting cap. So it is fine to use it to laying sabotage bombs for when we invade. Or even to distract Sombra when he attacks us instead. Price is also a little bit less so more money in the treasury for when the war starts.
Now that the main problem I had with the explosive research has been answered I am fine with switching out the second overtime action on that instead of more flamethrowers. We can build more flamethrowers next turn and do the firebender reserach for it as well.
[] Plan War Prep and Boom V3
Martial: 2 actions
[] The Peregrine Line-The Gates to the North (1) Locked
[] Army Artillery (1) 500
Diplomacy: 2 action
[] Steam Pump Exports (1) 50
[] Boom Tubes for the Dragon-Blooded (1) 0
Stewardship: 2 action
[] Settling the Western Frontier (1) Locked
[] Imperial Irrigation Program (1) Locked
Learning: 2 actions
[] Camouflage 101 (1) 200
[] Machine Tools (1) Locked
Intrigue: 1 action
[] Captain Karl Kaboom's Explosive Adventures (1) 40% 400
Personal: 2 action
[] Overtime: Recruitment Drives (1) 1500
[] Overtime: Blasting Jelly (1) 300
Treasury Reserves: 1240
Yearly Income: 5850
Yearly Expenditures: 540
Net Income: 5310
Cost: 5310-2950=2360
Net= 2260
Treasury= 3600
Right so all of our overtime and martial is to increase the Army's power as much as possible. If Questor says we can at least do both the flamethrower improvement and snow counteraction and we can start it with a personal action then one might be switched to that instead.
Diplomacy is all about improving relations and strengthing our more powerful ally. Right now the Yaks meeting doesn't help us as much as improving the fighting power and output of the Neignpon. Giving them weapons that improve their chance to stop the bigger force is a must.
Stewardship is all locked up and the farming increase should reverse quite a bit of the food problems we have right now. They are both large increases in income from taxes, but for the program and settlement at least it is new mining income, farming income, and lumber income as well. This is a whole new area that is full of potential growth.
Learning depends on Questors answers, for now, it is about improving our greatest weapons against the shadow beasts that Sombra uses. The Flamethrower might be stationary but the liquid fire itself is very mobile, and the firebombs, and moltovs all get the same boost.
Intrigue it is time to set things up whether or not we invade next turn getting that sabotage ready we be very important in keeping our people alive when we do invade.
All overtime goes to the army and military no other way around that we need the power boost.
With so many locked actions every plan will come in under budget and grow our treasury so we have something to use when the war starts. With the increase from the new income sources finishing up this turn next turn we can use up most if not all of it and still have enough for actions afterward. If we invade as well then it is okay to go into debt to make it as in our favor as possible.
Edit: Alright switching out the firebender for stealth research. Cost is the same and we can do the firebender on the same turn as a war if need be.
Edit 2: Switched out more flamers for the blasting jelly it is the safer version of the explosive that doesn't degrade like dynamite and won't explode without a blasting cap. So it is fine to use it to laying sabotage bombs for when we invade. Or even to distract Sombra when he attacks us instead. Price is also a little bit less so more money in the treasury for when the war starts.
Keani
C̵͍̈t̷̼̓h̴̀ͅŭ̶̹l̴̡̈u̸̫͗ ̶̟͌F̵͚́h̶̠͊t̶͍͌ă̷̺g̴̯̊n̷
- Location
- R͈̥̲̦͍͓͗̽̈́̚'̞ͧ͛ͥ̄l̫̰̤̖̽̐y͍̲ͧ̒́̐̌̀e̪͆h̸̩͔̟ͣ͐͐̎ͤ
Get an enchanted fruit or chunk of wood or something and see what happens when you stab it.
- Location
- Italy
Now the only difference from mine is artillery instead of the tour (that I hoped would synergize with recruiting, but I admit I had no proof of it)
..I can live with that. Whatever approval/morale we lose now should be recovered after the war anyway.