(Oh, ok, thanks for clearing that up.)
"...alright, I'll take a minishuttle up. Don't know how well I can pilot those things, though..."
Having made myself comfortable down below, head back up and grab a minishuttle. Familiarize myself with its controls.
After a long and tiring ladder climb back up to the first floor you head to the garage, wave to Lars and hop into the mini-shuttle's open cockpit. It's much like the normal shuttle's controls, just more bare bones and simplified. The control gauntlets that let you manipulate the ship are just the metal frames with exposed wiring and sensors; the seat has no padding, outside of the self adjusting airpads on the harness. You get yourself strapped in, adjust the monitors and wiggle your fingers in the gauntlets. They're stiff. This thing is brand new, straight out off the assembly line and only missing the shrink wrap.
Regardless, you think you can fly it as well as the normal shuttle.
ooh im not missing out on grabbing me some goop, grab sample containers and jump in the minishuttle seconds before takeoff.
You grab a few sample containers and hop onto the ship, taking the second of four seats.
((IC bragging rights, yes. Maybe OOC too. 
))
Let's just assume that I spent the previous turn loading up food, and half-a-dozen drones into the MPV trailer. Let's also assume that I got Zephyrus to help me out.
This turn, get into the MPV and drive nothwest. Unless Zephyris displays her own initiative, she's going with me. While driving, send out a drone to to the edge of the crater line, to observe what will be happening. Then continue driving until I hit the edge of the flatzone.
Once I'm there, send a message to Miyamoto: "Leader, I've taken the liberty of loading up food into the MPV, and driving it out to the edge of the flat zone.
Now there's more room for people in the shuttles, and if we have to evacuate the base, we'll have something to subsist on." And I don't have to trust those amateurs flying skills.
After that, drive it west to between the flat zone, brown towers, and the purple lake. ((I don't expect to finish all of that in one turn, but that my queued up action.))
Once this is done, we seriously need to establish a second base, (shelter) in case something happens to existing one. Complete with food, and maybe even air.
Perhaps one of the base's building blocks could be disconnected for that purpose.
Lets just say you get to the area between the Flat zone and the Gel lake with cargo in tow.
The MPV is out of power now as well.
((Damn it, right when I got to post, PW's done the turn.))
To Miyamoto: I have no idea how it works, but I can do very little with it consciously. Best I've done intentionally is stick a finger in a wall before it stopped letting me go through. Unintentionally, it made it so I got through the colony mission without a scratch. It seems to work both ways, and I'd bet with someone like Jim it'd be even better, especially in terms of conscious control.
After emerging and seeing the damage: It may have killed our precursors and gotten us sent here, but I think we should all be glad that gravity seep is outside the base. It deflected the thing from hitting us, not to mention that it also made that radioactive anomaly much safer for us by capturing the bulk of it.
After receiving orders: You got it, Miyamoto.
Fly with Miyamoto to the lakebed and get a High-EX grenade prepared.
We'll just assumed you flew with him when he took Lukas. Just deduct a bit more fuel from him.
get in mini shuttle..
seat 3 of 4 taken
"Fuck you, that was before I had to deal with a giant, walking crystal that fires beams of death that carve out canyons in ONE SHOT! That's almost battleship levels of firepower, and that's pretty fucking scary to anyone you asshole, not to mention somewhat out of our league! We've never had to deal with worse than that before!
Now let's get out there and blow shit up before I decide to piss in your air refreshing unit so you'll smell it every time you get in that suit of yours."
Grab my rocket rifle and ammo and fly after Miyamoto.
You too join Miyamoto with his gathering forces at the side of the dry lake bed.
From his vantage point by the black towers, Denzel stares at the aftermath of the beam from afar."Wonder what they woke up this time... Ah well, might as well head back to base."
Return to base if I'm not there already.
I assumed you were at base since your team got air lifted a while back. So yeah, consider yourself there.
Lukas starts looking for a good spot to dig in.
"Thanks Miyamoto, this should give me a better shot."
Look for a good spot to dig in and charge the particle cannon. Figure out my chances of hitting the crystal f*ck from here.
Hmm..well you're closer, but you could still close the distance a bit. There's not a lot of great places to dig in around here; though it's not like any natural cover around here is gonna protect you. Chances of hitting the crystal, especially if you close in, and double especially if you use bullseye are pretty much 100%. Chances of it doing appreciable damage...questionable. Chances of survival if it decides to fire at you and you specifically? Zero.
"Well that is... new"
To Flint:"Noticed you're kinda stranded so I'm coming over and offering my services as required"
use rock lobber to make my way to flint and offer an escort back to base or perform any other service that may prove useful.
You join up with flint at the dry lake bed.
"Hah! I got it! It's bleeding! Yeah, that's right, just run away! You'd better run if you don't want to face the wrath of Flint Westwood! I'll come after you in a minute. But first, some science!"
Keep watching the creature.
Sample the orange stuff leaking from the creature, whatever it takes. Use container tied at the end of a pole method if getting too close seems dangerous.
"Stupid thing's gonna end up in the gravity seep if it keeps going that way. Heh! Oh, wait, the base is that way. Crap."
Consider whether or not it would be possible to detonate explosives on both sides of the canyon while the creature is passing in order to trap it or at least stop that fluid from reaching the crater.
@Science People:"I'm going to take a sample of this orange stuff. Can one of you guys go back to the lab real quick and check it out, so that we know if we should stop it from getting close to the base?"
The creature continues on it's path, dumping more of the orange fluid into the canyon as it does. However it hasn't dumped enough that you can reach it. Canyon is pretty damn deep and the fluid is only filling the bottom. Unless of course you want to fly down into the canyon and scoop some up. Also, the creature doesn't seem injured; the fluid seems to be being released purposefully, the way it cracked open at the bottom seems deliberate; symmetrical and limited to just the bottom.
As per using explosives to collapse the walls of the canyon...maybe, though the creature would probably just walk around the blockage. Might block the fluid though.
[...]
Unless Zephyris displays her own initiative, she's going with me.
[...]
Do not show initiative and go with Vich.
"I just hope the food doesn't go bad during our little tour."
You sit on the trailer and let vich drag you all the way out to the space boonies.
Anton looks at the sensor data with a worried, but not entirely disconcerted look. The intent of the crystalline entity is unclear, but so far it follows a pattern. Something big and crystalline lashing out at the base in response to the HMRC actions, and hitting the gravimetric trash compactor instead. Anton furrows his brow, recalling the events.
"Curious.."
His thoughts are interrupted by the radio coming alive with Miyamoto's shouted commands.
Anton and Michael, you each take a minishuttle, load 3 other people up and get the hell out, fly to the edge of blacktower fortress if you can. You should be safe from further shots there.
"No can do, Leader. Anyone flying with me on a shuttle would be safer here, heh. Besides, with that gravity sink right next to us we aren't going to find a safer place unless we dig ourselves a cave under the Flatlands.
More importantly, I believe what you are about to do is only going to worsen the situation, even if not directly. This planetoid may seem out to get us at first glance, but you really should look at what we've been doing, and ask yourself a question. Why would it be? It's been reacting to our actions, not our presence. And you're about to commit yourself to military action against it. A stray shot landing in the wrong place could do anything around here. Think your plan through again, please.
And if you want my opinion, we should concern ourselves with long-term survival, not short-term displays of force. If you need me, I'll be looking over our main shuttle."
Get a few essential tools from the Garage, get outside, and begin as thorough an examination of the downed shuttle as is possible. Look in my datapad - I tried offloading some standard HMRC equipment schematics to it before the mission, see if a shuttle such as this is among them. If not, look for a technical manual and/or a service manual in the cockpit. Start finding ways to get at the damaged components without needlessly dismantling the shuttle's exterior.
You've got the manual for the shuttle. You pull it up and start wandering around the damaged craft; comparing diagrams to reality and trying to spot the difference. The major damage is obvious; it's a fist sized hole through a bundle of wires. Lucky shot too; it snuck in through the space between two armor plates and several hydrulic pieces for the upper right rocket pod. Repairing and patching it should be fairly straight forward, assuming wires were the only thing that was damaged.
The difficulty comes from the other points of damage; the tiny shards of metal that tore hoses or nicked wires, the hidden damage. Ironically, Morul might be the best person to help you with this.
((This universe just hates me making any sort of plan, 'cause each time I commit to one it just throws everything upside down again.))
"Fuck you, that was before I had to deal with a giant, walking crystal that fires beams of death that carve out canyons in ONE SHOT! That's almost battleship levels of firepower, and that's pretty fucking scary to anyone you asshole, not to mention somewhat out of our league! We've never had to deal with worse than that before!
Now let's get out there and blow shit up before I decide to piss in your air refreshing unit so you'll smell it every time you get in that suit of yours."
Grab my rocket rifle and ammo and fly after Miyamoto.
'Yes, that's the kind of foulmouthed asshole I need! Good to have you back man.
Oh, and if you ever look at Gilgamesh wrong I'm going to shove my boot so far up your rectum you'll be tasting its soles. '
Once I'm there, send a message to Miyamoto: "Leader, I've taken the liberty of loading up food into the MPV, and driving it out to the edge of the flat zone.
Now there's more room for people in the shuttles, and if we have to evacuate the base, we'll have something to subsist on." And I don't have to trust those amateurs flying skills.
After that, drive it west to between the flat zone, brown towers, and the purple lake. ((I don't expect to finish all of that in one turn, but that my queued up action.))
Once this is done, we seriously need to establish a second base, (shelter) in case something happens to existing one. Complete with food, and maybe even air.
Perhaps one of the base's building blocks could be disconnected for that purpose.
'Not a bad idea, in fact I was going to ask you all to help me in getting our supplies, or at least part of it, to the AI control chamber. But then that thing started shooting weird deathlasers, and it kinda went downhill from there. Though I'm not sure we have the tools or the manpower to shove parts of that base around. Oh well, we can discuss this once this crap is over.'
Anton looks at the sensor data with a worried, but not entirely disconcerted look. The intent of the crystalline entity is unclear, but so far it follows a pattern. Something big and crystalline lashing out at the base in response to the HMRC actions, and hitting the gravimetric trash compactor instead. Anton furrows his brow, recalling the events.
"Curious.."
His thoughts are interrupted by the radio coming alive with Miyamoto's shouted commands.
Anton and Michael, you each take a minishuttle, load 3 other people up and get the hell out, fly to the edge of blacktower fortress if you can. You should be safe from further shots there.
"No can do, Leader. Anyone flying with me on a shuttle would be safer here, heh. Besides, with that gravity sink right next to us we aren't going to find a safer place unless we dig ourselves a cave under the Flatlands.
More importantly, I believe what you are about to do is only going to worsen the situation, even if not directly. This planetoid may seem out to get us at first glance, but you really should look at what we've been doing, and ask yourself a question. Why would it be? It's been reacting to our actions, not our presence. And you're about to commit yourself to military action against it. A stray shot landing in the wrong place could do anything around here. Think your plan through again, please.
And if you want my opinion, we should concern ourselves with long-term survival, not short-term displays of force. If you need me, I'll be looking over our main shuttle."
((Wait, didn't you have a bonus to aux? I thought you did, going from Paris' notes...
Oh wait, it was Auron with the bonus, not Anton. Darn your slightly similar names!))
'Hey, I know it is probably not targeting us our our base, hell I'd be surprised if it even knew we existed. But when I gave the order to move out, I though it would keep shooting that laserthing it had. I just wanted to make sure that, if it charged up for another shot, we could stop it somehow.
However it seems to be going back to its dormant state now, so we might wait a bit longer to see what it's up to now.
And despite what you seem to think of me, I get no satisfaction out of displaying force or blowing stuff up. I'm just trying to be cautious and ensure our survival, even if it means having to shoot something that isn't deliberately assaulting us.'
Get into whatever cover there is around here, see if it is safe to use my manipulator from this distance.
'Ok guys, get ready but don't fire just yet, we might make it through without bloodshed... crystalbreaking after all. Plus, Flint is in the way right now.'
Cover is a bit silly, all things considered. Your suit is better cover then any stone around here and it's not like stone has shown itself to be very resistant to that thing anyways. Still, you crouch down behind a boulder as best you can. When it comes to using your manipulator, you could manage it from here; the target is big enough obviously. Though if you'll have any effect on it is questionable...it's so huge, and you have no idea how tough, but it seemed to tank a laser without trouble.
By the way, the map is now updating automatically from here:https://www.dropbox.com/s/wvvfviqlvkl3i9t/overall%20map.png
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Topic: Einsteinian Roulette (Original Thread: Rules, Armory, Misson archive 1-11) (Read 3936827 times)