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Author Topic: Mad Arms Race - Mereth Design Division (Fall 1965 - Final Design Phase)  (Read 83488 times)

Chiefwaffles

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Re: Mad Arms Race - Mereth Design Division (Fall 1963 - Revision Phase)
« Reply #630 on: November 25, 2018, 06:42:48 pm »

CHEAPRADIO: The "Communicator: Highly Encrypted Audio, Potentially Reusable As Distant Interface Option" is, as the name clearly suggests, a cheap radio. A decent chunk of design time will be spent negotiating with the Union of Electronics Workers, forcing them to accept more reasonable wages, and allow for modernisation of production equipment. The rest of our time will be spent updating the components used in the WALK-TALK, making it smaller, adding encryption, and possibly increasing the range slightly. Integration into Bear Armour is important as well.
Of lesser concern, but worth looking at if we have the time, is ensuring that the CHEAPRADIO technology can be scaled up to transmit more data... like, CAT levels of data. The basic radio needn't be capable of it, but it would be nice if we could combine a bunch of them to allow for some... interesting options in the future.
Revision: CHEAPRADIO
(Easy) (1+3)+1 = 5: Average

In other news today, the government has come to an agreement with leaders of the Merethan Union of Electronics Workers. The exact details are unclear, but workers have agreed to lower wages and "more efficient" benefits for unknown compensation.

Look, the warehouse of unused prototype Drop Bear suits wasn't going to empty itself, okay? Plus we made them all sign non-disclosure agreements and agreements to not come after us when if the suits fail mid-flight. But instead of focusing on the fact that we just gave every worker that made our radios jet suits, we should focus on the fact that we have cheap radios now. About damn time. Command was getting tired of yelling really loudly.

Also included are some other modernizations. The WALK-TALK is a bit smaller, and we included very rudimentary encryption hardware so the Necrostate will actually have to provide some semblance of work for its intelligence if they want to go for that route. Integrating it into Bear Armor is trivial.

We couldn't do anything regarding the proposal to scale up bandwidth, but we did run a precursory investigation into that possibility. The CAT runs a lot of data. A lot. Like, a ton. Most of it probably isn't needed ultimately for the basic commands and controls we have now, but even if we theoretically managed to send/receive only the essential data, it's still a lot. So we'd need rather powerful radios for that. Then there are other faults with radios and CAT data, such as the lack of 100% reliability. The level of precision required for this data is, like the bandwidth, very high. A few mistakes in sending/receiving and we can potentially have, say, a Grizzly trying to bend its knee backwards. (By the way, don't try to test it, we did and had, uh, casualties.)

Spoiler: Designs (click to show/hide)

The Combat Phase of Fall 1963 has begun. Last chance to enter contest submissions! (Contest summary is "media describing your domestic enemy"; see last Combat Report for more)
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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!

dgr11897

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Re: Mad Arms Race - Mereth Design Division (Fall 1963 - Combat Phase)
« Reply #631 on: December 10, 2018, 07:39:13 pm »

Quote from: assault hovercraft design
Mk1 Sea-ranger
The sea ranger is a heavily armed fast attack hovercraft. Designed with the goal of being able to attack enemy landers and bring some semblance of an actual conflict back to the sea. The sea ranger is equipped with a shrike turret and associated birdbrain array, allowing it to hit just about anything. The craft itself is about the size of an excavator, and utilizes the electric fan system from the skyranger for propulsion. Making it one heck of a fast bugger. For close in defense it is equipped with a single turreted autocannon, and mostly relies on its speed to survive on the battlefield.
« Last Edit: December 10, 2018, 07:56:10 pm by dgr11897 »
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m1895

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Re: Mad Arms Race - Mereth Design Division (Fall 1963 - Combat Phase)
« Reply #632 on: December 11, 2018, 06:38:13 pm »

PTW
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Madman198237

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Re: Mad Arms Race - Mereth Design Division (Fall 1961 - Design Phase)
« Reply #633 on: December 11, 2018, 06:54:06 pm »

Quote
ME-GWM-6X 'Firedrake'
Since the invention of the Gatling gun, people everywhere have wondered: "What would happen if you rechambered this for a long 20mm cartridge, motorized the turning system, and added a hideously powerful incendiary and a chemical capable of freezing things? AND THEN, what if you stuck it onto a 3-meter-plus tall metal monstrosity and told it to go kill things?" OK, maybe they haven't actually wondered EXACTLY that, but still.

The Firedrake is a brand-new integrated weapons system for all our forces. Specifically, it is a 20mm 6-barrelled rotary autocannon connected via armature to a box full of ammunition and a Birdbrain-type single gun targeting computer, capable of picking out things that don't have a friendly IFF and asking the user if they would like those things to stop existing. Aircraft, tanks, infantry platoons, the Birdbrain will find them all, and then allow the user to lovingly press a firing button to dispose of those things. It can be mounted on anything that has space, including empty space on the ground, as a backpack on a Grizzly (the gun then fires over the Grizzly's shoulder. The box is "small" enough that two can be mounted on a Grizzly's back, one over each shoulder), or on Blizzards.

The firerate alone is enough to chew through tank armor given enough time, but the largest innovation is in the projectiles. In them is what the DUC described as "a sufficient amount" of an incredibly volatile mixture of the nastiest chemicals the DUCs have ever gotten their hands on, a few ounces of which can burn through a tank and the concrete floor beneath it. We're not actually sure what's in there because the DUC-to-Sane People Liason had a fatal heart attack in the middle of the list. We think it included "chlorine trifluoride". And frankly, we don't want to know. We've decided to call this new horror FIRE: Fluoride Incredibly Reactive Exothermic, in honor of the way it burns everything.

As an added bonus, FIRE can be used in any weapons that use warheads (Sarukh, autocannon, Grizzly cannon, naval guns, bombs and Shrikes), because it's just another type of warhead. But more deadly, because DUC was bored since we've given them so little to do. Or so they said...

I should probably stop thinking about this Arms Race and go finish my final project. But I just started wondering: What happens if you were to take an autocannon, mix it with a super incendiary and a Birdbrain pod, then start sticking it on every vehicle we have?

Includes a box o' bullets with a chopped-down Birdbrain for just the one gun which is mounted on an armature capable of pointing it at pretty much anything the Birdbrain can spot. Also FIRE. Should be capable of anything from air defense to antitank work to just general murdering. Since it will also fit on Blizzards, it should improve our air forces' killing ability too.

Yes I should probably not even bother since we don't know when Chief's going to write the next turn, but I just had to.
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NUKE9.13

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Re: Mad Arms Race - Mereth Design Division (Fall 1963 - Combat Phase)
« Reply #634 on: December 12, 2018, 01:31:32 am »

Did you forget about CLAW?
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Madman198237

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Re: Mad Arms Race - Mereth Design Division (Fall 1963 - Combat Phase)
« Reply #635 on: December 12, 2018, 02:40:32 am »

Not really, why do you ask?
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m1895

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Re: Mad Arms Race - Mereth Design Division (Fall 1963 - Combat Phase)
« Reply #636 on: December 13, 2018, 05:35:15 pm »

(Is this what you were going for nuke? Sorry if the writing’s a bit too rough.)
Bear CLAW

The standard CLAW is fine for what it is, but it could be so much more. By including a modified Birdbrain system with IFF, a rechargogel motorized mounting and a magmagel tank. We are able to use the bear CLAW as an anti-ordinance, anti-armor, and anti-personnel system.

As well as the previous alterations we would like to add a new fire mode to the CLAW. While boring a hole through an enemy is useful, by increasing the energy of a pulse it turns whatever surface is struck into plasma, causing explosive expansion.

The bear CLAW will be available in three mountings, a standalone quadrupedal mounting, on a bear armored troopers shoulder with the magmagel tank in place of an ICE thrower tank, or upsized on a grizzly’s shoulders. If possible we should alter the magmagel mix to minimize magmatite usage while still retaining the same effectiveness as current magmagel.
( if we do something like this we should revise GASOLINE to find magmatite.)
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Chiefwaffles

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Re: Mad Arms Race - Mereth Design Division (Fall 1963 - Combat Phase)
« Reply #637 on: January 12, 2019, 07:34:58 am »

Combat Phase: Winter 1963

We're pretty lucky that most of our population lives where they cannot see the sky or experience weather. Those who do live above-ground however aren't too happy with the fact that the weather is distinctly owned by Aratam now. But the Skyranger is a huge success, and if the ORACLE-A had feelings chances are it'd say the same thing.

Spoiler: Designs (click to show/hide)

The Design Phase of Winter 1963 has begun.
« Last Edit: January 12, 2019, 08:09:47 am by Chiefwaffles »
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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!

NUKE9.13

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Re: Mad Arms Race - Mereth Design Division (Winter 1963 - Design Phase)
« Reply #638 on: January 12, 2019, 10:21:37 am »

So, Madman's Hellborer is now canon. On the one hand, this is bad, as it makes expanding MAGMA much harder. On the other, it means we can do this:

PURE IRON:
You may have heard about the cessation of MAGMA expansion. There is, of course, an official excuse- something about cost concerns- but the real, classified, reason are the beings colloquially known as Hellborers. Well, we heard about the Hellborer corpse being held in a maximum-security warehouse, and went to check it out, along with some chemists from the DUC. Though almost pulverised by bullets and explosions, the remains were still fascinating. The structure of these beings resembles nothing on Earth (as in, nothing on the surface). We were especially interested in its natural armour and "iron" skeleton, so we had the DUC run some tests on samples extracted- with great difficulty, given the extreme hardness- from the beast.
Quote from: A short excerpt from the delivery of the report
"Moving on, test 012, elemental analysis of sample 003, skeletal matter. Sample 003 was found to consist of entirely of iron isotopes, with no other elements present."
"I'm sorry, I think I misheard. Did you say no other elements?"
"Yes, that is correct."
"That's insane. Earlier you said tests revealed sample 003 to be ten times stronger than steel!"
"This is also correct."
"But... everyone knows alloys are stronger!"
"Sir, I am an Unusual Chemist. I do not believe in what everyone knows. And I'm telling you, sample 003 is pure iron."
"No alloys? Solid iron?"
"Correct. Although, I should mention that the ratio of Fe-60 was unusually high, at almost 6%."
"Remind me, how common is Fe-60 in nature?"
"Fe-60 has a half-life of 2.6 million years, only occurs in supernovae, and is found only in trace amounts in most iron deposits. Most Fe-60 on earth is believed to have arrived here as stellar dust after a nearby supernova roughly 2 million years ago. Samples of iron ore from the lower levels of MAGMA show increased levels compared to surface deposits, however, for which there is no explanation."
Naturally, we ordered immediate further study into Fe-60's properties. The results were astounding. Fe-60 on an atomic and molecular level behaves like regular iron. However, on a macro scale, things get Unusual. A mere 1% of Fe-60 makes iron almost twice as strong as regular steel. Increasing it to 6% results in an eightfold increase. 100% Fe-60 has, so far, proven impossible to test the effective strength of, as it has broken every piece of testing equipment we have.
(Astute observers may note that the Hellborer skeleton contained 6% Fe-60 and was ten times stronger than regular steel, as opposed to the eight times we found in testing. It is not known how this extra strength is gained; the DUC has requested access to a living specimen in order to observe the growth process in action, which MAGMA overseers have absolutely refused to consider. Research is ongoing, but for now, we'll have to settle for our slightly weaker Fe-60.)
Furthermore, Fe-60 seems to hate electrical currents. Even small amounts significantly reduce the iron's natural conductivity, to the point where 10% Fe-60 can be used as insulation.
Attempting to alloy iron containing significant amounts of Fe-60 somehow nullifies the extra strength- it returns to behaving like regular iron. Indeed, all attempts to add significant impurities to the iron have resulted in this- anything below 99.98% iron becomes substantially weaker. So, pure iron it is.
Or rather, PURE IRON- Pilfered Underground Rock Eater's Intensely Robust Organic Negator. The name merely indicates where the inspiration came from; we're not actually planning on harvesting Hellborer skeletons. No, the iron deposits found above Hellborer territory contain sufficient levels of Fe-60 for us to produce PURE IRON plating that is as strong as- if not stronger than- COMBAT plating, all at a significantly reduced cost. The metallurgical experience gained creating COMBAT plating will not go to waste, as finding a way to reliably extract Fe-60 and smelt it without adding impurities will require skills not often employed elsewhere.
The exact percentage of Fe-60 in PURE IRON plating may be altered, depending on cost concerns. Our goal is to be able to replace all our armour with PURE IRON containing enough Fe-60 to be effectively as strong as COMBAT plating, but should Fe-60 prove easier to extract than anticipated, stronger PURE IRON may be issued. Should Fe-60 prove harder to extract than anticipated, COMBAT plating may continue to be used on certain units, whilst those who can't afford it are equipped with PURE IRON.


E: Fallacy pointed out that COMBAT plating is also, crucially, resistant to electrical attacks. I'm considering adding electrical resistance to PURE IRON, but that might be pushing it. I mean, the main reason I even like this idea is for the meme value.

E2: Screw it, added a line about Fe-60 reducing conductivity. Chiefwaffles has indicated that he likes PURE IRON, and has said it'd auto-roll an 8 if I can make a backronym for NO ALLOYS.
« Last Edit: January 12, 2019, 01:22:48 pm by NUKE9.13 »
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FallacyofUrist

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Re: Mad Arms Race - Mereth Design Division (Winter 1963 - Design Phase)
« Reply #639 on: January 12, 2019, 12:03:40 pm »

Artificial Designer of Merethian InterNals:
We've had a bit of a problem with certain expensive vehicles of ours. The Grizzly, the Skyranger, the Blizzard. The units that make the most difference in our war are incredibly expensive. What would the war be like if they were cheaper, we wondered? We thought of several ways to cheapen them, from improved materials, or increased resource gathering, to throwing more ICE Cream at our engineers. Then someone hit upon a bright idea: Why not adapt ORACLE-A's optimization abilities to designs and factories? ADMIN, or the Artificial Designer of Merethian InterNals, is our latest artificial intelligence project.

ADMIN is a learning computer, much like ORACLE-A, but with a different purpose: Optimization of design. Weapon design, vehicle design, factory design. Like ORACLE-A, ADMIN learns from how things work, and suggests improvements. And those improvements lead to efficiency, and less wasted resources. We intend to use ADMIN to cheapen our Grizzly, Blizzard, Skyranger, in order of priority. Another thing we're hoping to improve with ADMIN is our COMBAT plating, using its artificial intelligence analysis capabilities to make it more efficient, but cheaper Grizzlies are our first priority.

To improve our manufacturing even further, we've created improved machines designed to be controlled by ADMIN. Robotic "arms", for example, that can perform assembly at great speed and efficiency. And of course all the other machines that go in a factory, placed under ADMIN's direct, hyper-efficient, control.

There are some worries that this pursuit of efficiency will alienate workers. Do not worry. All workers who lose jobs thanks to ADMIN will be offered free places in the Merethian army, possibly even as combat engineers! In this way they can continue to show patriotic fervor for our country and our war effort.
« Last Edit: January 12, 2019, 02:38:04 pm by FallacyofUrist »
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Madman198237

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Re: Mad Arms Race - Mereth Design Division (Fall 1961 - Design Phase)
« Reply #640 on: January 12, 2019, 12:20:21 pm »

Quote
ME-GWM-61 'Firedrake'
Since the invention of the Gatling gun, people everywhere have wondered: "What would happen if you rechambered this for a long 20mm cartridge, motorized the turning system, and added a hideously powerful incendiary and a chemical capable of freezing things? AND THEN, what if you stuck it onto a 3-meter-plus tall metal monstrosity and told it to go kill things?" OK, maybe they haven't actually wondered EXACTLY that, but still.

The Firedrake is a brand-new integrated weapons system for all our forces. Specifically, it is a 20mm 6-barrelled rotary autocannon connected via armature to a box full of ammunition and a Birdbrain-type single gun targeting computer, capable of picking out things that don't have a friendly IFF and asking the user if they would like those things to stop existing. Aircraft, tanks, infantry platoons, the Birdbrain will find them all, and then allow the user to lovingly press a firing button to dispose of those things. It can be mounted on anything that has space, including empty space on the ground, as a backpack on a Grizzly (the gun then fires over the Grizzly's shoulder. The box is "small" enough that two can be mounted on a Grizzly's back, one over each shoulder), or on Blizzards.

The firerate alone is enough to chew through tank armor given enough time, but the largest innovation is in the projectiles. In them is what the DUC described as "a sufficient amount" of an incredibly volatile mixture of the nastiest chemicals the DUCs have ever gotten their hands on, a few ounces of which can burn through a tank and the concrete floor beneath it. We're not actually sure what's in there because the DUC-to-Sane People Liason had a fatal heart attack in the middle of the list. We think it included "chlorine trifluoride". And frankly, we don't want to know. We've decided to call this new horror FIRE: Fluoride Incredibly Reactive Exothermic, in honor of the way it burns everything.

As an added bonus, FIRE can be used in any weapons that use warheads (Sarukh, autocannon, Grizzly cannon, naval guns, bombs and Shrikes), because it's just another type of warhead. But more deadly, because DUC was bored since we've given them so little to do. Or so they said...

Well, it gets rid of tanks and helps our aircraft perform better strafing runs. It also functions well now, whereas we need more resources to make truly useable CLAW weaponry for aircraft.

Quote
ME-PLC-61 TALON Tank Application of Laser OrdiNance
Based on the CLAW, the TALON laser system is basically a scaled-up version capable of delivering millisecond pulses of laser energy, enough that the target's surface explodes into plasma, short enough that the resulting cloud doesn't waste (too much) of the pulse's energy. The intent is to make a Grizzly armature, Bear Trooper-moved emplacement [tripod with a laser cannon on top, aimed, fired, and moved around by Bear Troopers], or Blizzard mounting that is capable of delivering a single devastating pulse to flash large amounts of armor or flesh into an expanding cloud of deadly-hot plasma. It uses the minimum amount of Magmagel for this purpose, and thus has a very low rate of fire for a laser weapon.

If we cheapen Grizzlies in the revision, this gives them an unfailingly accurate way to destroy pretty much anything, in really cool fashion.

I'd also propose Brainwave again, if we can figure out a way to cheapen Grizzlies at least in the revision.
« Last Edit: January 12, 2019, 12:22:54 pm by Madman198237 »
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NUKE9.13

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Re: Mad Arms Race - Mereth Design Division (Winter 1963 - Design Phase)
« Reply #641 on: January 12, 2019, 02:09:50 pm »

Our number one priority this turn is getting our Grizzlies to Expensive. We do that, our fortunes should improve considerably. PURE IRON is designed to do this, by replacing the COMBAT plating (which costs ore). ADMIN could also work, though it may be harder (and less fun). I really don't think better weapons are what we need right now- we can kill them just fine, we just need the numbers.

Anyway, there's still plenty of time for discussion, but just FYI, my vote is for PURE IRON. NO ALLOYS!*
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dgr11897

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Re: Mad Arms Race - Mereth Design Division (Winter 1963 - Design Phase)
« Reply #642 on: January 12, 2019, 02:16:49 pm »

Project ICE-STORM
Incredible Chemical Endotherm, Storms of Thunder Obliteration Method.
This project aims to disrupt our foes control of the weather by reducing atmospheric humidity and thus destroying cloudcover before it can be used. How does it do this? By launching missiles that distribute ICE canisters with parachutes and other methods of staying aloft inside the clouds of a thunderstorm, then, these canisters pull the water out of the nearby air by causing it to freeze around the canister, creating large chunks of ice that capture the water and dust particles making the enemy lightning storms possible. These large chunks of ice then fall to the ground and impact the battlefield at high velocity, causing a localized hailstorm of massive ICE chunks. This also works on normal clouds, allowing it to be used as a method of hitting foes over a wide area.

(Because I couldn't resist the horribly forced acronym and disrupting their storms turns this war in our favor.)
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Madman198237

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Re: Mad Arms Race - Mereth Design Division (Winter 1963 - Design Phase)
« Reply #643 on: January 12, 2019, 02:31:56 pm »

Our number one priority this turn is getting our Grizzlies to Expensive. We do that, our fortunes should improve considerably. PURE IRON is designed to do this, by replacing the COMBAT plating (which costs ore). ADMIN could also work, though it may be harder (and less fun). I really don't think better weapons are what we need right now- we can kill them just fine, we just need the numbers.

Anyway, there's still plenty of time for discussion, but just FYI, my vote is for PURE IRON. NO ALLOYS!*

The thing about PURE IRON is that it tries to remove COMBAT plating, which is a really cool gimmick that is very useful. I'd rather not just go the route of replacing it with generic wonder material #240485 "super strong version of iron". The acronym is appropriately funny (and painful to read), the joke is pretty good, but still, it does replace a cool gimmick with a less cool one, even if I do appreciate that Hellborers may actually have some use. Maybe instead make it so that the joke is that it IS used in a COMBAT plating alloy/combination/whatever we call the thing that COMBAT plating does---making it more effective in exchange for costing Hellborer corpses instead of regular Ore.


Also, yes, we'd like to get Grizzlies to Expensive, but that's not the only way we have of turning this war in our favor. Improving all our units (hello, Brainwave) to be simply better, making some sort of ultra-lightweight bomber to follow the Blizzards into combat zones and just drop dozens of guided missiles, or making weapons for Grizzlies and Bear Troopers to be better at AT warfare, etc, all of them would likely help us out. Focusing the mountains this turn and winning them would ALSO cheapen Grizzlies if we can hold them.
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FallacyofUrist

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Re: Mad Arms Race - Mereth Design Division (Winter 1963 - Design Phase)
« Reply #644 on: January 12, 2019, 02:50:58 pm »

You know what would get Grizzlies, and possibly COMBAT, to Expensive? ADMIN. For good measure, it would improve our computing tech, which would be wonderful for a lot of future advances, such as autonomous drones.
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