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Author Topic: Galaxy Spark [SG] - Tactical Retreat  (Read 1121 times)

Chiefwaffles

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Galaxy Spark [SG] - Tactical Retreat
« on: December 21, 2016, 10:16:37 pm »

"ALRIGHT! This is it! 1st Homeland, engage! 3rd and 6th Tertiary, engage plan Alpha-6! 9th Support! Stay back and stick to plan Charlie-1!"


Immediately, you drop out of hyperspace as you brace yourself against the tactical map. Outside the tiny windows and through the massive displays located across your bridge, you see the rest of your fleet dropping in in mass numbers. Each one beginning fire and maneuvers as soon as they materialized into reality. Bombers started to swarm out towards their predetermined targets and fighters circling their host ships. Seconds later, the capital ships begin dropping out as well, with huge bangs that resonated through space for reasons unknown to you.
The hostile fleets are no less prepared than your forces. Without hesitation, beams and energy weapons start impacting against the hulls and shields of the newly-emerged ships, some breaking apart within seconds of entry. But as each second passes, the organization of the armadas grows more and more chaotic with the opposing sides beginning to spread out across local space to find a better tactical advantage against their foes.

You avert your gaze back towards your own bridge. The officers scurry about console to console, relaying information about the local area and the ship, as the entire crew awaits the activation signal. Your ship is a part of the 3rd Tertiary Combat Fleet, currently adhering to battle plan Alpha-6. Once the activation signal is received and the enemy forces are focused engaging the 1st Homeland Defense Fleet, you will begin independent combat operations in an attempt to strike at and flank their fighting forces.

"Activation signal received! Repeat: Activation signal received!" an Ensign yells from another side of the bridge. The entire room bursts into activity even greater from before as the panicked bridge staff begin final preparations.

This is it. The battle to retake the homeworld of your once-mighty civilization. You glance at your senior officers for consul.
"Kinetics loaded and ready to go, sir. As long as we don't engage one of their Dreadnoughts head-on, we should be able to put in some serious damage."
"Shields are online at full functionality and all the systems are green. The ship's ready for combat. As long as we stay away from focused enemy fire, we should last quite a while."
"Sensor scope confirms TacCom's assumption and we will be able to slip through their front lines unopposed, sir. TacCom is reporting hostile long-range missile fire overwhelming the Dreadnoughts' point defenses, enemy fighters preventing bombers from getting close, and some kind of support ships remotely reinforcing the enemy front line's shields. I recommend we endeavor to help 1st Homeland, sir."

The battle ahead is going to be tough. In order to succeed, you're going to need to do more than give a rough target. You're going to need to truly command. With a mild frown presenting itself on your face, you focus. The ship you're on is a Spark class corvette. It's small and is designed to fulfill a minor role in fleet engagements. What is that role, and how does your ship class accomplish it?
...and with that bit of knowledge ready, you're prepared to make your first order since you dropped out of hyperspace. What are your first orders, Captain?

Spoiler: GM Note/Explanation (click to show/hide)
« Last Edit: December 23, 2016, 03:29:29 am by Chiefwaffles »
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Quote from: RAM
You should really look to the wilderness for your stealth ideas, it has been doing it much longer than you have after all. Take squids for example, that ink trick works pretty well, and in water too! So you just sneak into the dam upsteam, dump several megatons of distressed squid into it, then break the dam. Boom, you suddenly have enough water-proof stealth for a whole city!

S34N1C

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Re: Galaxy Spark [SG]
« Reply #1 on: December 21, 2016, 10:56:33 pm »

you overuse "Galaxy" in your titles

Our ship is an experimental strike vessel that used beaming technology to transport bombs into the enemy ship.

Orders are to begin flanking the enemy and target the command ships. Take out drones/other shit as necessary.
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Dustan Hache

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Re: Galaxy Spark [SG]
« Reply #2 on: December 21, 2016, 11:24:33 pm »

you overuse "Galaxy" in your titles

Our ship is an experimental strike vessel that used beaming technology to transport bombs into the enemy ship.

Orders are to begin flanking the enemy and target the command ships. Take out drones/other shit as necessary.
This, but instead of beaming tech, let's go with the gauss of space travel: sub-hyperspace launcher.
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ZBridges

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Re: Galaxy Spark [SG]
« Reply #3 on: December 21, 2016, 11:47:04 pm »

you overuse "Galaxy" in your titles

Our ship is an experimental strike vessel that used beaming technology to transport bombs into the enemy ship.

Orders are to begin flanking the enemy and target the command ships. Take out drones/other shit as necessary.
+1
« Last Edit: December 21, 2016, 11:51:29 pm by ZBridges »
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RoseHeart

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Re: Galaxy Spark [SG]
« Reply #4 on: December 22, 2016, 02:38:49 am »

you overuse "Galaxy" in your titles

Our ship is an experimental strike vessel that used beaming technology to transport bombs into the enemy ship.

Orders are to begin flanking the enemy and target the command ships. Take out drones/other shit as necessary.

FTL?
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S34N1C

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Re: Galaxy Spark [SG]
« Reply #5 on: December 22, 2016, 11:31:16 am »

you overuse "Galaxy" in your titles

Our ship is an experimental strike vessel that used beaming technology to transport bombs into the enemy ship.

Orders are to begin flanking the enemy and target the command ships. Take out drones/other shit as necessary.

FTL?
Never heard of it
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Chiefwaffles

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Re: Galaxy Spark [SG] - Homefield Battle
« Reply #6 on: December 22, 2016, 02:41:25 pm »

Our ship is an experimental strike vessel that used beaming technology to transport bombs into the enemy ship.

Orders are to begin flanking the enemy and target the command ships. Take out drones/other shit as necessary.

You realize you forgot something...
Right - the names of your senior officers. Next to you stand the Security Officer, the Intelligence Officer, and the Engineering Officer. In the long run you're going to need to know more than just their titles, after all. You also conclude you should probably know the name of your ship by the time you're in battle. But for now, you disregard your concerning memory loss because now you have a fight to win.

The Spark class Strike Corvette. A cunning design, using prototype beaming tech to deliver lethal payloads without worrying about point defense and similar countermeasures. During the testing of the first Spark classes, they observed that a Spark required a notable amount of time to calculate the hyperspace trajectories for the beaming tech. This would become its greatest flaw; the payload delivery device would take too long to target to truly replace missiles in modern naval combat. But the engineers persevered.
The result was a fast and agile corvette, with the intention of bombing vital targets and escaping without a dent. To make up for the targeting time, it was equipped with two frontal railguns. These guns would allow the Spark to continue being useful in combat during targeting. A spinal weapon was foregone in favor of room for the delivery device. Fighters deemed unnecessary. Only a handful of Sparks were constructed by the time the manufacturing facilities were scuttled to prevent enemy capture, and you pilot one of these sparks.

"Intelligence!" you bark. "Give me a gap in their flanks!"
Immediately responsive to your command, the Intelligence officer runs the short path to the primary sensor console and leans over the seated Ensign while discussing something with him. After a surprisingly brief period of time, he stands up and faces you.
"We've got an incoming gap. We should be able to get past their defensive network in approximately a minute. Engineering?"
"Correct." states the Engineering officer without even a glance upwards from her device.
"And that's it - we should be able to slip past easily."
Without further thought, you know your plan of action. "Get us through when ready and let's see if we can do some damage. Security, find us some apparent command ships to target."
"Roger."

A minute passes, but time seems to have just about ceased with the tension of the battle around you. The tactical map paints a vivid picture of the battle via its signature symbols overlaid in the space above it. You watch your allied ships respond to the flow of the battles with the commands of TacCom, and how the countless enemy ships repel the reformed plans with ease. Reinforcements continue arriving, as the rest of the fleets from more distant systems find their way to the battle.
You spent the apparent eternity studying the table for targets with your Security officer. He mutters observations as his fingers point to different central-looking dots within the enemy hordes. Finally, you both come to a consensus on a small group of targets hidden behind their front-lines.

Suddenly, the Intelligence Officer pops back into existence from somewhere near the sensor consoles. "Alright, we have our opportunity. Helm, I want thrusters to max through these particular coordinates." he orders, staring at a tiny absence of dots at the side of the enemy fleets. The crew is lurched backwards as the gravity systems adjust to the new acceleration. The tiny white dot representing your ship starts to speed towards the cloud of red on the tactical map.

"We're being targeted. Engineering, shields ready!"
"Shields are ready, yes. Any passing potshots should be shrugged off for now."

The white dot is starting to be absorbed into the envelope of pure red as your senior officers - barring Engineering - grow increasingly concerned. The ship starts periodically shaking in response to impacts on the shields.

"That'd be the shields and the potshots I mentioned earlier. We're not being chased, right?"
"It doesn't look like i-
-No. The enemy ships are resuming in their previous maneuvers - they either didn't notice us or don't believe we're important enough to change plans."
"...and to confirm that statement, we're losing the targeting locks now at the same rate we're gaining them. Just as long as we don't suddenly stop, they shouldn't actively pursue us. And sir, we're approaching our targets."

"Begin targeting with Payload Transporter. In the meantime, use our kinetics to clear out any strikecraft and pursuing ships."
"Yes, sir. Ensign! Begin calculations towards Target C! Intelligence - I'm going to need your help finding these ..."

The corvette whips around in space right at the moment it enters the range of the large command vessel, dodging the occasional laser fire from surrounding ships. A hostile ship breaks from the formation to intercept you, but is unable to get past the shields. You watch as the railcannons situated on the front of your vessel finally pierce through that ship's armor and hit the reactor, causing a meltdown and eliminating the hostile from play.
"I'm seeing more of them breaking off to engage! Security, please handle this!"
"Shields are getting dangerously low! We don't have much time before having to rely on armor!"
You look at the status screen, confirming Engineering's claim. "If engaging their vessels is only going to draw more in, we need to limit ourselves to the payload transporter and point defense. Engineering! See if you can transfer some degree of power from the Railcannons to shields."
"I'll see what I can do, sir!" she yells as she exits the bridge.

The ensuing battle provides a steady flow of impacts against the shields, and eventually the armor. As the frequent enemy weapons fire manages to hit the ship despite its evasive maneuvers, payload targeting continues. You hear the repeated and somewhat comforting sound of the Autoturrets firing at detected missiles and other projectiles, hopefully keeping at least some harm out of your way. The panicked Security Officer announces the status of payload delivery calculations every time the progress bar on his console moves. The Engineering Officer isn't even on the ship, and is instead working with Damage Control to try to get damaged systems functional again. Intelligence is still maintaining a calm appearance as he moves from console to console, determining the state of the battle.

"Sir!" The familiar voice of your Engineering Officer comes in over radio. "It doesn't look good - we have damage to the Reactor, Life Support, and Shields. I haven't had much time to survey the system damage to Life Support and Shielding, but I've had some luck in keeping the Reactor from exploding and keeping it delivering power. The damage's pretty light and we don't have a hull breach here, but Damage Control teams are reporting breaches across the ship."

You're getting tenser by the second. Annoyed with the current affairs, you turn to the Security Officer, who's already looking at you. "Please tell me targeting is almost done."
You swear you see his frown dissipate for a moment as he begins speaking. "I was just in the process of informing you, Captain. Targeting is complete, and we can fire when ready."
"Fire."

Finally. You begin formulating a plan to get out of here once the payload is delivered. Thrusters are still at full functionality, and last you checked, you should be able to outrun most if not all of their ships. Once out, you can do something about the damage and begin helping in another, way. You cough and wave some smoke away from your face.

"Payload... delivered!"
Almost immediately, the intimidating Dreadnought that was looming just outside of weapons range experiences an explosion begins to envelope the entire vessel. The Dreadnought breaks apart under the extreme pressure and smaller explosions go off across the ship, likely from smaller critically failing subsystems or secondary reactors. By this time the expanding explosion isn't even from your payload, it's originating from what you can only assume to be the Dreadnought's primary reactor. A few nearby enemy ships are caught in the blast despite their best efforts to escape it, and go down with their mother ship.

"We've done what we came here to do. Get us out of here and lose any chasing hostiles."

The Ensign at the helm begins to engage full thrust out a gap again provided by Intelligence, but the Intelligence Officer starts to look extremely worried.
"Perfect." he says under his breath before turning to face you completely. "Captain, it looks like the Dreadnought's entire escort is now pulling out of formation to chase us and just us."
"It looks like they're out of weapons range for now, but we're going to have to pass through a large amount of them to escape."

You stare at the tactical map. A swarm of red is exiting their parent cloud in order to pursue you. As the white dot exits through the formation ships, your entire vessel begins to shudder as it receives a massive amount of weapons fire. But it looks like you survived, because it quickly ends and the tactical map shows your ship triumphantly outside of the enemy swarm. You shift the gaze of the tactical map to the allied fleet, which is in dire conditions by this point.

Your fleet is shredded and scattered. TacCom is ordering the tactical retreat of whole fleets before you get back into safety. Eventually, you hear a fleet-wide announcement from the Commander.
"Attention, all fleets. This battle is over - I want all fleets but the 3rd Tertiary to disengage and retreat. 3rd Tertiary, cover their retreat."
With the announcement, new orders appear over the tactical map - "COVER RETREAT OF ALLIED FORCES."

Your senior officers, all assembled at the Tactical Map and looking at you, offer their opinions.
"We're out of range of just about all their weapons, and it looks like taking out that Command ship has put the closest part of their fleet into disarray for the time being. Honestly, Captain, without the support of the main fleets, we can't do much."
"I don't think our ship can handle much more, sir. We've encountered heavy damage and I haven't even finished determining all the damaged sites. Shields are down and will be for a while, and the armor is practically nonexistant by this point."
"It looks like the majority of their fleet is jumping out to pursue our retreating forces, so we may have a chance of succesful engagement if we attack from behind the front lines of the 3rd Tertiary, but even our own fleet is heavily harmed - most of their ships have been destroyed. So engagement may not be the best option."

The planet below is the homeworld of both you and your civilization. Hiding is an option, running away is an option, fighting is an option, and just about anything you think of is an option. Regardless of what you do, however, this battle is lost. What are your orders?


Spoiler: GM Note (click to show/hide)
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Quote from: RAM
You should really look to the wilderness for your stealth ideas, it has been doing it much longer than you have after all. Take squids for example, that ink trick works pretty well, and in water too! So you just sneak into the dam upsteam, dump several megatons of distressed squid into it, then break the dam. Boom, you suddenly have enough water-proof stealth for a whole city!

S34N1C

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Re: Galaxy Spark [SG] - Homefield Battle
« Reply #7 on: December 22, 2016, 04:20:08 pm »

Intelligence officer: James Barr
Engineering officer: Helga Bronken
Security Officer: Nick Green

Ship Name: [fleet acronym(HMS, USS, whatever)] Homer
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ZBridges

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Re: Galaxy Spark [SG] - Homefield Battle
« Reply #8 on: December 22, 2016, 05:41:46 pm »

Intelligence officer: James Barr
Engineering officer: Helga Bronken
Security Officer: Nick Green

Ship Name: [fleet acronym(HMS, USS, whatever)] Homer
+1

I think we should flee.
« Last Edit: December 23, 2016, 02:35:03 am by ZBridges »
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Chiefwaffles

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Re: Galaxy Spark [SG] - Tactical Retreat
« Reply #9 on: December 23, 2016, 03:29:19 am »

"Retreat with the rest of the fleet - try to keep us out of combat."

The ensign at the helm quickly responds to your orders and asks for coordinates from Intelligence Officer Barr. Barr visibly hesitates before answering.
"Coordinates sent. Captain, we were given orders to stay back and cover their advance." he dejectedly states. "But I suppose we won't stand a chance otherwise."

The bridge staff continues scurrying about the bridge as the hyperspace jump is still in the process of being made. Barr spends most of this time studying the sensor readouts and Tactical Map, looking for signs of enemy interest in the ship. Allied forces engage in frequent skirmishes as they come into range with remnants of the enemy fleet, with mixed results. As the enemy command appears to feel that their work here is done, more hostile ships leave the battlefield to pursue other objectives.

Suddenly, the hyperspace jump is aborted as Engineering Officer Bronken sprints into the room.
With a minor amount pf panting in her voice, she begins speaking. "I was just looking at the diagnostics and it's all wrong. Something's not right with the destination."
"What?" interjects Barr. "The destination is a local rendezvous point with the rest of the fleets. I don't think it's likely the Protectorate are even aware that the destination exists."
"I don't think it's the actual destination we intended to go to, but rather the effective one. This is the intended exit point, correct?" she asks as she holds up her tablet to Barr's face.
"..yes. What's your point?" he asks quizzically.
"It's nothing close to the place we were going to jump to. It's some kind of sabotage; I'm sure of it. The effective destination would have to be some kind of trap. Captain, I've already tried a large amount of possible exit sites for our hyperspace jump and if we don't want this override, we're going to have to make a jump to a fringe world."

You think about the implications about this before continuing. "Alright. Officer Barr, work with Officer Bronken to determine a suitable destination that won't lead us into a trap"
The two officers nod their heads and walk to one of the consoles together before they start conversing about various matters. Over the next five minutes, they manage to find a suitable site to flee to - a colony on the edges of former Federation space that you never heard of - and you give the go-ahead to make the jump. The rest of the plan goes along successfully and finally, after a couple minutes of preparations and hours of travel time in hyperspace, you arrive at Tarim's Landing.

"Captain, I've done some analysis on Tarim's Landing during the voyage and I've just sent my report to you. It'd appear that none of our compatriots made the decision to flee here, unfortunately." states Barr as he walks by you towards another sensor console.

You have a damaged ship, no reinforcements or allied fleets nearby, and an occupied Federation that you plan on saving. The corvette, while it lacks a shuttle and the payload transporter was never deemed safe to transport humans, is able to land on the ground of planets.
Well, if you're going to save an occupied civilization, you can't do it alone, can you?

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Quote from: RAM
You should really look to the wilderness for your stealth ideas, it has been doing it much longer than you have after all. Take squids for example, that ink trick works pretty well, and in water too! So you just sneak into the dam upsteam, dump several megatons of distressed squid into it, then break the dam. Boom, you suddenly have enough water-proof stealth for a whole city!

Gwolfski

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Re: Galaxy Spark [SG] - Tactical Retreat
« Reply #10 on: December 23, 2016, 08:17:18 pm »

Check fuel level  and check comms.
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ZBridges

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Re: Galaxy Spark [SG] - Tactical Retreat
« Reply #11 on: December 23, 2016, 08:22:16 pm »

Check all systems to determine the extent of the damage.
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Mlamlah

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Re: Galaxy Spark [SG] - Tactical Retreat
« Reply #12 on: December 24, 2016, 06:02:31 pm »

Position ourselves in deep orbit around the system's star, away from the planet. Then begin working on preliminary repairs, partially with the intention of getting us a thorough damage report.
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