Turn 7 : Design PhaseHacker: "Polar Coder"
Chill out, man. Cool it. Stay frosty.
The Polar Coder is a fixture in the Firmament. It would be difficult to change this, since Polar doesn't want it to change, and he definitely has the ability to prevent it. Some other hackers have belittled his stubborn ways- hacking is all about flexibility, adapting moment by moment, never standing still. Polar reacts to these jabs with good humour, as those in the know are well aware of Polar's skill, and the whining of script kiddies has never bothered him. True, most hackers are fast, agile thinkers... but is that what makes them a good hacker? In Polar's view, needing to adapt is proof that you are too weak to make the world bend to your will. A great hacker, he believes, is one who doesn't need to be fast. Other hackers are like rushing water, carving out nice waterfalls and building interesting deltas... whilst Polar is like a glacier, grinding the very mountains into dust, dominating all laid before him with inexorable momentum.
What motivates Polar is on the surface a simple lust for domination. On a deeper level, however, his goals are more ambiguous. There are rumours that he came from a wartorn region of the world, where chaos reigned and the people were exploited- as such, he seeks to dominate the world in the hopes of preventing chaos. It explains his distaste for some of the less orderly members of the Firmament- he believes that existing corporations and governments are unsuitable stewards of order, but ultimately seeks to replace them with new structures that will actually safeguard the common people. With him at the helm. After all, he is definitely a good person. According to his own immutable moral standards, anyway.
On the battlefield, Polar Coder excels in two areas: slowing down opponents, and gradually building up his forces before methodically destroying the foe. Slowing the enemy can mean delaying actions, but Polar can also literally slow down enemy units and hackers. By unleashing his so-called 'Blizzards', flurries of seemingly random data that interfere with programs in an area, he decreases the clock speed of viri and makes deploying battle chips take more effort (as the opposing Hacker has to carefully mitigate the Blizzard's effects). These Blizzards are Polar's secret weapon, one he is unwilling to share even with other members of the Firmament.
When a battle begins, Polar will first secure his defenses, ensuring his forces are deployed in areas where they have a significant advantage over attackers. He will then begin to build up his strength, until he has the overwhelming force necessary to push the front line forwards to a new defensive location. Once captured, the new location will also be fortified, and the cycle repeats- until the enemy is ground to dust. In the event that a push fails, or that the enemy manages to capture one of Polar's fortified positions, he will calmly pull back. Let the enemy wear themselves out on his layered defenses.
In summary, Polar Coder is good at:
-Slowing down the enemy, both with small delaying actions and with his signature Blizzards.
-Finding and fortifying defensive positions.
-Overwhelming the enemy with slow, methodical assaults (once his forces are built up).
Polar is less good at:
-Rapid/complex manoeuvres.
-Quick thinking, adapting to unprecedented events (while he makes contingency plans, these can only cover so many possible outcomes)
-Using a full duel disk- he always needs space for his Blizzards.
4 + 3 - 1 = 6 : Above average (Hard)
The combative coder known only as Polar can sometimes be something of a strange fit with the more free wheeling and independent members that make up the majority of the Firmament's membership. Nonetheless, the Polar one is still a loyal member of Firmament, and has recently been convinced to bring his own unique skills out of the general ranks and works and onto the battlefield. Rumor has it he's even looking forwards to crushing his foes on the open battlefield, which is a task he's well suited for. A master of siege warfare, if more focused on the defense then the offense, Polar specializes in the American style of war. That is, building up a strong economy and then burying the enemy with the resulting armies. He is not a fast moving commander however, and can be outmaneuvered or out-tricked by more skilled or more cunning commanders. Especially in the early portions of a new battlefield, or in another setting where he does not have firm foundations to conduct delaying operations from.
He also comes with a unique code-chip of his own design, which he has so far not been inclined to share. The PolarBlizzard strategic battle chip wraps the battlefield in a code blizzard that interferes with both programs in general, slowing all units down in an area and preventing optimal functioning, and interferes with attempts to deploy other battle chips into the area. Being of his own personal design, the coder known as Polar always deploys with at least one copy of the chip.
Turn 7 : Design PhaseDelivery Droppod Deepstrike - Class: Strategic Codeburst - tl;dr: Long range, middling capacity, one-way troop transport.
After securing the Amazon Canopy, Firmament hackers got busy studying and reverse engineering the various ways the companies in the canopy manage their same-day or even same-minute delivery deadlines across all of cyberspace. Drones, hyperspeed tunnels, dig-reinforced platinum chips, and many other solutions were found, but the one that stood above and beyond for strategic and tactical application in the Great Flame War was the Delivery Droppod™. By taking their armored canisters and data-shunting technology, the Firmament was able to develop a codeburst that rapidly deploys a group of units deep infield with minimal chance of interception.
Rather than the more permanent and harder to maintain Gateway codeburst, the Delivery Droppod Deepstrike (DDD) deploys a group of units wherever the hacker deems necessary across the entire battlefield, with almost surgical precision and breakneck speed. By encasing the selected units in protective and G-force dampening datashells, and then shipping them with high priority, they can arrive to outflank, outspeed, or reinforce a given area. Even beyond typical hacker zone-of-control for strategic codebursts such as Squad Summon S or the like, aided by the datashell maintaining their code's coherency until they reach their destination.
The main limitation of the DDD is it's one way nature and transient nature. Hackers should bare in mind to send at least one unit with some degree of advanced AI and/or to a place with active officer support in the area. A whole bunch of minions sent too far without oversight won't be particularly beneficial.
4 + 4 - 0 = 8 : Unexpected boon (Normal)
Just as requested, Firmament coders adapt coding from the Amazon Commercial Canopy to serve the purposes of rapid unit redeployment. While the need to prep units to be deployed in this manner somewhat slows the use of this battle chip beyond normal, the ability to deploy roughly a platoons worth of Viri across the battlefield at will and at high speeds is not one to be discounted. Neither to be discounted is the difficulty in interfering with the droppods, for they are both very fast moving and well armored. In fact, they are so well armored that the code-team that created this battle chip ensured that the resulting pods would remain in existence for around a minute to three minutes after deployment, allowing deployed units to use the landed pods and temporary cover.
This is all what they did during the first half of the scheduled design time. In the second half, they added a completely new and unrequested feature to the battle chip. That is, they added the ability to transport other battle chips (or their effects) and deploy them by way of the droppods. So far the only use for this has been the ability to deploy the MinionCall A and SquadSummon S chips beyond the ranged they would normally be deployed, if at a slower then normal deployment speed and the cost-effectiveness issues of needing two chips for the same amount of resulting summons, but this is a feature which could easily be adapted to serve other battle chips that can not normally be deployed deep into the enemy territory as well.
Despite the general success inherent in this design, the resulting chip is still Complicated, mainly due to the lack of overall experience and pre-existing infrastructure needed for the production of chips of this type.
It is Turn 7, in the Revision Phase. During this phase you must vote on what revision to do to your current assets. During this Revision Phase you get two revisions, but one must be in theme for an area you have under your control.
Hackers
CF_Dogcatcher
Ophilia Bailey is a hacker specialized in the obscure and weird forms of viri which she finds most interesting, but is also very familiar with standard corporate security fixed defense programming, as her last 'real job' was as a corporate data-security officer. Tactically, CF_Dogcatcher is specialized to figuring out the enemy's cunning plans and ruining them, but she can suffer when she tries to figure out the cunning plan of a hacker whom is not using cunning schemes and just has a metaphorical, or more literal, hammer.
DJ King Cabaret
A man once sued for reasons of 'we have more money then you', DJ King Cabaret has a well working understanding of shock and awe tactics, and his experience running a pirate radio station has also given him a well honed sense of trickery and deception from the need to befuddle and avoid the Net Police. Despite this preference for attention getting, in battle the real threat with him is a hidden dagger. However, his actual skills as a hacker are somewhat lacking, which can hinder him in a variety of ways including his ability to properly deploy battle chips into conflicted codespheres. As well, his mixed feelings about an AI songtress such as Sonata may sometimes cause him to be less then rational in direct engagements with her Stagehands.
Polar Coder
A coder who holds a home built battle chip close to his chest, the Polar Coder specialized in fortifying his position, launching large and straightforwards brute force take and hold attacks from his fortified positions, and slowing down his enemies both with delaying attacks and his own personal battle chip. His skill suffers, however, when he's asked to adapt to unexpected situations outside of his contingency planning, undertake complicated maneuvers, or when his insistance on using his own personal battle chip backfires. Despite these issues, he's still very good at making an army march forwards and destroy the enemy.
The Polar Coder must use at least 20% of his memory banks on personalized battle chips.
Viri
Minion.exe
These roughly humanoid programs are neither very sophisticated (intelligence and coding wise) or very strong, but they are mass producible and smart enough to obey orders without continual direct supervision. Which isn't always something you can take for granted with generic digital constructs, as a lot of them are dumber then rocks. They're not coded with anything more powerful then a basic energy pulse pistol, but they can still defeat the average civilian whom thinks too much of themselves. Just avoid putting them up against Data Police Agents. (Simple) (Obsolete)
CarbineMinion.exe
Roughly humanoid digital constructs with just enough brains to obey commands without needing continual direct and personal supervision. They've been upgraded over the original Minion.exe programs with a somewhat more advanced Pulse Carbine weapon that includes a charged shot function and slightly greater firing rate and normal shot damage, but have very limited programming on when to use their charged shot. However, ADI or a supervising hacker can use a command call to order local CarbineMinions and Officers to fire a charged shot at a target if needed.
(Simple)
RifleMinion.exe
Roughly humanoid digital constructs with just enough brains to obey commands without needing continual direct and personal supervision. They were supposed to be upgraded over the original CarbineMinion.exe programs with a cut down version of the Hunter.exe's Pulse Railrifle, but unforeseen issues resulted in their weapon exploding when the program attempts to use it. This makes them fairly undeployable.
(Simple - Theoretically)
Wyrm.exe
Mindlessly aggressive flying snakes with plenty of teeth, the Wyrm.exe is an utterly expendable melee virus used as often as ablative distractions for other viruses as anything else. Being even stupider then a Minion, Wyrms are entirely dependent on outside authority for things such as 'targeting priority' and 'not giving away an ambush' and 'knowing when to retreat', and require very strong hard-coded friend foe identification coding to prevent friendly fire. And even then they still tend to kill each other off. They've got some swarm programming, mainly enough to keep them from getting in each other's way too much, and despite being theoretically a Simple virus their dependency on outside control limits the amount that can be safely deployed.
They've been updated with superior swarm programming, allowing for increased teamwork, less fratricide, and a cloud computing/bit torrent based memory system that allows them to remember longer and more complicated orders.
(Simple - Theoretically)
Officer.exe
Based on the generally available in the Undernet Minion programs, Officer.exe constructs aren't much stronger then their lesser kin, still only coded with a basic energy pulse pistol, though officers also come with basic melee coding. But the big difference between and Officer and a Minion is that Officers are coded with noticeably more advanced bit-brains and have a basic tactical library integrated in their knowledge banks, allowing them to lead teams of Minions on operations without needing constant hand holding.
They've been upgraded to use more advanced Pulse Carbines with slightly greater firing rate and damage, as well as a charging function, and now are programmed to know how to both use the charging function personally and how to command the CarbineMinion.exe programs to properly use their own as well. Instead of firing a charged shot, they can alternatively use it for a short term moderate-minor boost to their speed or toughness. (Complicated)
FirstMate.exe
An upgraded Officer with a piratical look. The FirstMate.exe has a vastly expanded tactical library that was designed to be easy to customize or expand on for new unit types later on, as well as dedicated coding for using special abilities that is also easy to expand on later on. They also have a secondary six slot tactical library for immediate use to prevent time wasted considering all the plans in their large tactical library. FirstMates carry a basic charge carbine and an energy cutlass with a magnetic attraction effect against enemy weapons and shots. Lastly, they have seventy-five alternate uniform skins. (Complicated)
Scout.exe
A three wheeled trike with a turret mounted pulse pistol stolen from a Minion.exe, a flare launcher and a powerfield ramming prow that prevents the pistol from firing while active. Recent updates have made it noticeably more intelligent then the baseline Minions who's brain-coding the Scouts used to share, and it is now far more able to actually scout or harass enemies without dying pointlessly and without a report. They are noticeably better at teamwork then a baseline minion for scouting or combat by way of using swarm coding meant for real life drones. (Complicated)
Hunter.exe Ver. 0.9-B
A specialized sniper based on, but much more advanced, then the CarbineMinion.exe who use rifles almost as tall as they are. They have specialized sensors for long ranged fire, and can fire charged shots at up to the third stage of charging as well as being able to 'double tap' their second stage charged shot for two rapid fire projectiles at the second charge of power. They have limited abilities for independent operations by use of two 'hot loaded' tactical slots that can be filled from either a highly limited personal tactical library or by local officer type programs, but have minimal capacity for making any tactical choice more complicated then 'who do I shoot first' on their own. (Complicated)
Tunneler.exe MKII
A refined and bugfixed modification of the Scout that replaces all of the Scout's old equipment with a drill tipped prow to allow for tunneling. After a cycle of error-squashing the Tunneler.exe MKII now works without noticeable issues or need for sustained attention. Simple but high efficiency engine and drill systems allow for active tunneling even through tough substances and an easy to use navigation system allows for user friendly tunneling efforts. As the Tunneler tunnels, gathered waste data can be used to reinforce their tunnels, preventing cave ins. (Complicated -> Normally effectively Complex to Very Complex)
Chamelee.mon
A feathered dinosaur raptor virus with mantis like bladed hands and hind-limbs, Chamelee.mon viruses are not anywhere near being properly self aware but still possess a high quality and flexible tactical library for teamwork based hunting and skirmishing tactics even if said library is almost solely focused on those subjects. They are near invisible while still, and less so but still hard to accurately pinpoint when in motion making them hard targets to land a shot on even though, if shot, they are not much if any tougher then a minion. They can be manually assigned a high priority target though how they go after said target is still up to them, and have a slider for effecting how highly they rate their own self preservation. Officers can use these, but are not programmed to except for setting the self preservation slider to max when they decide it's time for all forces to retreat. (Complex)
Wako.mon
Cyclopean pale giants recruited from the tunnels of the Archival Sediment, Wako Warriors weld distinctive datana blades and wear high quality armor coded from bronze scales as well as possessing the ability to unleash searing, if short ranged and stamina draining, eye laser blasts. They also demand a high price for their labor, requiring both high quality 'food' and access to a variety of luxuries, as well as demanding that the deepest tunnels of the Archival Sediment remain un-invaded. These requirements, and their tendency to refuse what they consider to be 'stupid orders', makes them hard to deploy. However when deployed they are potent warriors, skilled in tighter confined and closer quarters then is usual for combatants of their stature. (Complex)
Autonomous Digital Intelligence
Vivi_Paltest.dat
A gelatinous and gluttonous naga with a collection of strange and interesting code shards and a habit of eating things she finds interesting to add them to her collection, Vivianaja Palladian is the Firmament's first ADI champion, and serves it well with her variable armaments and defenses pulled out from her collection as she remembers them as well as her own noticeable personal toughness and ability to patch herself up with loose data. Worryingly, her collection includes what seems to be coding of military origin, though Vivi denies ever visiting the military owned sectors of the Cyberworld before this conflict started. (Memory 4)
Ikarus.P2
The escaped and rogue protagonist of a long lasting series of SHUMP games, Ikarus.P2 is haunted by the sacrifice of his elder brother. While this has resulted in a fighter both skilled and dedicated to the Firmament's freeware mission it has also resulted in his doubts in the value of the Great Flame War in comparison to the actual official mission of the Firmament. However, with the advancements in Firmament forces caused by the iterative effort of the Great Flame War Ikarus.P2 has finally agreed to participate in said arms race. Ikarus.P2 is armed with a pair of high caliber vulcan cannons and a slow-recharging energy rocket launcher system capable of being used in anti-air (direct fire) or anti-ground (arc fire) modes. While he has long used up the last of his power ups, he remains in possession of the modular systems which those packets interacted with, and could put them to use again if a new source is found or designed (Memory 4)
Battle Chips
Recovery 10
This tactical battle chip is designed to mend damaged and corrupted code, healing the individual it is applied to by a minor amount. (Simple, Memory 1)
Atk+10
This tactical battle chip pre-allocates resources to empower the next program used, improving the targets ability to deal damage for a short while. (Simple, Memory 1)
MinionCall A
This strategic battle chip creates temporary replicas of the commonly known ‘Minion.exe’ program, causing a short term burst of reinforcements in the targeted zone. (Simple, Memory 1)
SquadSummon S
This strategic battle chip is an upgraded, though more complex, version of MinionCall A that can summon a (smaller) squad of minions and officers of variable, if pre-set before the mission, type, It may only summon one version of minions and one version of officers, and can not be adjusted in the field. (Complicated, Memory 1)
Swyrm W
This strategic battle chip is based on the existing MinionCall and SquadSummon battle chips and serves to summon in a flock of explosive Wyrm.exe programs. Sadly the produced programs explode almost as fast as they are summoned, and the chip lacks the accuracy and execution speed to be used to summon explosions on top of an enemy position. These issues render the chip, while usable, completely unused by all Firmament hackers. (Complicated, Memory 1)
Delivery Droppod Deepstrike
A Strategic effect battle chip that allows for either the rapid repositioning of around a platoon (50ish) troops in eight or so armored drop pods that remain long enough to give some initial armored cover to the deployed viri, or the use of the pods as a 'carrier platform' for deploying other strategic or tactical battle chips beyond the ranges they'd normally be able to be deployed at.
(Complicated, Memory 2)
PolarBlizzard
This strategic battle chip covers an entire section of the battlefield with bursts and gales of random code data, having a detrimental effect on everything within the effected zone. Viri are slowed and suffer bit-brain errors from stray data, 'line of sight' and other sensory modes are greatly degraded, and it becomes entirely more difficult to target other battle chips within the blizzard's zone. Even friendly battle chips are effected by this targeting interference, for the data-blizzard is truly random. It would take a unit with specialized hardening to function normally in such a weather effect. (Complicated, Memory 1)
CallChiptune
'CallChiptune' is a Battlechip that uses the Firmament's vast archives of abandonware soundtracks to summon appropriate music for any occasion. It's ability to figure out what music is appropriate can be a little off at times though, but who doesn't like a cheery 8-bit soundtrack going on in the middle of a desperate battle to keep viruses from deleting your homework? (Simple, Memory 0)
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Topic: The Firmament - Great Flame War Arms Race (Read 20921 times)