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Deep Core

7 (100%)

Savannah

0 (0%)

Total Members Voted: 7

Voting closed: November 21, 2010, 08:49:53 pm

[Muz]

Titans of Steel is a great game, probably on my top 3 of best indie games. Described here:
http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=70011.0

This is my first LP, so it'll be a bit sloppy. Playing semi-blind. I've played the earlier versions many, many years ago, but haven't gone past Light class in Warring Suns, and even that was years ago. Let's mess it up and have some Fun.

It's also a permadeath game with permanent damage. I won't be savescumming unless things get really bad, so there'll be some deaths


First off.. making a squad. I started off making the first char based on me. Let's hope he doesn't die.


The name seems to be used as a random seed for the stats, the same name yields the same stats.


A good start in charisma and leadership, so obviously I'm the leader Apparently, I'm a prodigy with scanners, which is an awesome starting skill. Since I've got decent starting Reaction and Dexterity, I think I'll specialize in Cannons or Energy. I'm torn between cannons and energy weapons.. cannons dish out nice damage, but energy weapons are more awesome. But because of low Damage Control (slightly more ammo explosions), I'm going with energy. Bumping up Reaction a bit for more energy skill (and better piloting).

I'll boost charisma/intelligence up a bit to get leadership up. I'm spending the rest on survival, because it's useful for ejecting and surviving hits. For combat, I'm dumping the extra into close combat. Close combat is a great skill to have when you're desperate to dish out a little extra damage. For piloting... both scouting and jumping are useful and cheap skills. But the titan I want doesn't have any jump ports, so I'll sink it all into scouting.




Now it's time to pick a titan. We're only allowed recons at the start, so less choices. Since my character is good with energy, I'll only look through the energy weapons. His decent scanning skill makes him useful at longer ranges too, so I'll go with a medium range energy titan.

There's a hell lot of nice choices. That tesla bolt titan certainly looks enticing, he could blast a recon off their feet with a single shot. But it's too close ranged and too based on luck. There's so many other choices - dual medium lasers, a neutron blaster, a cold light beam, flamethrowers, and a large laser.

I'm striking flamethrowers and medium lasers of the list - too close ranged. The neutron blaster is a great jock-killer, but you need some luck, and the minimum range is a deal breaker. It's between the large laser and the cold light beam. Both have similar damage on paper, laser goes a bit further and lights forests, but cold light does a bit more solid damage and a bit more accurate at short range. Since we'll probably end up fighting up close and personal, the range isn't as good a deal, so I'll go with cold light beam.

So the Quantum is my choice.





Now I need just 2 more jocks: a manager and a mechanic. We could add an extra if the budget allows, but best to save it up in case things go wrong. Manager needs high intelligence + charisma (business skill), mechanic needs high intelligence and dexterity (damage control skill). I'll let you guys throw in some ideas for jocks. Oh, and the squad needs a name.

If anyone wants to suggest ideas for jocks, just put them in the following format..

Name:
Callsign:
Gender:
Race:
Weapon specialization:
Manager or mechanic:

I'll probably toss in the names in, and pick whichever randomly generates the best jocks

Spoiler: Race (click to show/hide)

From the manual...
Humans don’t have any particular strengths or weaknesses. They get a +1 bonus on charisma and instinct.

Replicants are cloned humans, genetically enhanced either in dexterity (Replicant D) or intelligence (Replicant I); therefore, they receive +2 on one of those attributes. They are highly susceptible to radiation.

Cyborgs are sturdy humans enhanced with cybernetic implants. They receive +1 on constitution but suffer a -1 penalty on charisma. Cyborgs are less vulnerable to certain effects caused by damaged life supports or cockpit hits, and rapidly regain consciousness when knocked out.

Androids are intelligent robots that are also humanoid in appearance. They have self-healing abilities and are sexless. They do not benefit from the healing capabilities of life supports, but do benefit from shock absorption. They are very resistant to radiation effects caused by neutron blasters or engine explosions, and will never become unconscious. Androids gain +1 on both reaction and neural sense.

Gender also has some influence on the stats of a Jock. If you choose female Jocks, you are granted an additional +1 bonus on instinct; male Jocks receive +1 on constitution.

Spoiler: Weapon skills (click to show/hide)

Close combat (Instinct/Reaction) - They do the most damage, especially with recon titans. Power axes or chainsaws can do more damage than a big-ass laser or cannon, and a lot faster too. But close combat is worthless when a titan is knocked down, and completely helpless when they get a leg or arm ripped off.

Guided missile (Intelligence/Instinct) - The longest ranged weapon, with good accuracy and damage, but helpless at close range. I'm not a fan of them at recon level, they do as much damage as a good cannon, with slower loading times... but at much longer distances.

Unguided missiles (Dex/Reaction) - Nice weapons, they splatter damage all over the enemy. They hit many of the spots on a titan, and great for damaging components once the external armor has been worn down by a high damage weapon. There's also the napalm missiles, which do minimal physical damage, but can really heat up an enemy titan. Because the damage is not focused on a single point, they're not felt as much in the short term, but can really hurt after a few rounds.

Cannon (Reaction/Dexterity) - Great starting weapons, because even the small ones deal a lot of damage. There's not a lot of variety. There's small ones and big ones, long range gauss ones, really short ranged machine guns. And there's the risky meson guns, designed to penetrate armor and damage internal components, but are difficult to use. Cannons can be quite satisfying, because they dish out noticeable damage.

Energy weapons (Reaction/Dexterity) - They're hot and use up a lot of power. But they don't run out of ammo and come in more varieties. But since we already have an energy weapon specialist, it might be better to focus on another type.

Oh, and we need at least one of them to be a close/short range jock. The most damage can be dealt up close at the start of the game, especially with skills so low at the start and the inability to stack weapons of mass destruction on a small chassis. Later on, when everyone's more accurate at longer ranges, it's much easier to use medium/long range weapons.

[Burnt Pies]

Name: Catherine
Callsign: Raven
Gender: Female
Race: Replicant D
Weapon specialization: Close Combat
Manager or mechanic: Mechanic

Hope that comes out well!

[Keita]

Name: Sanya
Callsign: Kitcat
Gender: Female
Race: Clone
Weapon specialization: Cannons
Manager or mechanic: Manager

Loli manager, we cannot lose!

[mrchinchin25]

Name: Urist
Callsign: Soapmaker
Gender: Male
Race: Human (short)
Weapon specialization: Close-combat
Manager or mechanic: Mechanic

[Muz]

There's enough money to recruit all of them, so I did.

Spoiler: Sanya (click to show/hide)

Our loli had good stats to start with, overall average skills, but good intelligence, and charisma is cheap enough to raise. Electronic warfare skill and medical skills are miserable though. They're not that important, but she'll feel it if she gets unlucky.



So, just bumped up her basic skills a little, but it's left her with a lot of extra points I'll just keep for later.



Picking a good titan was a bit hard, but I went with the Lancer. A bit less firepower, but the extra accuracy and close range damage should make up for it.

Spoiler: Catherine (click to show/hide)

She's started out with average attributes too. A bit low at constitution, with great with skills, especially starting off with full survival skill.



So I trained up her intelligence, reaction, and dexterity. Overall good skills, just a bit low for her to be taking hits to the head.



The reason I bumped up her cannon skill was to get her driving the Swift Death titan, capable of dishing out a massive 28 points of damage every 8 seconds.

Spoiler: Urist (click to show/hide)

I thought Urist had good starting skills for a pure close combatant too, suitable for a dwarf, so I added him to the team. Good instinct, poor reactions and dexterity, but we could fix that with a little training. Also made him a cyborg, seeing that's how I'd imagine him being after the doctors get to him.


Bumped up those typical skills a bit, especially reaction. The lowly, slow soapmaker looks ready for battle now.


I thought a dwarf would like a titan with an axe, a long range weapon, and a bit of unarmed combat, so I gave him the Viking.

So there it is, looks like a good starting team with a nice balance of skills.

But before setting them off on a campaign, I think I'll give them a testing gladiatorial match to see how they work as a team. As these matches go, it's to the death.

[Keita]

Ouch! 16 medical?

I hope gets through this alright... Then again shes got good stats in everything else.

Can't wait for update!

[Muz]

Our group's just entered the arena. The most interesting part is that wooded chokepoint to the northwest. The woods should reduce long ranged attacks, while the narrow part keeps the group from being surrounded.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

There's a few glimpses of an enemy. Nothing special.. we get them into position just fine. Wait for the enemy to walk in, the lock on the target. Kitcat gets a full scan on the first target.. a close combat specialist.

Then a light titan drops out of fricking nowhere.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Everyone's still got their scopes on the smaller recon and scanning. Muz and Urist switch sights onto the light titan, Fox. Fox gets first blood on Raven.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Urist moves to directly confront her, Muz moves onto her right flank. She's moving a bit too fast for Urist to hit with the laser, so they stand waiting for her to stop.

As soon as she does, Urist lifts his axe and cleaves her hard up the left torso...

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

The force of the blow was enough to knock her down. Urist blasts her once with the laser as she tries to get up.

A Wasp titan, piloted by Sereena, pops in from the west, it's rather low in firepower, with a single AC12 cannon. But it's still capable of hurting at close range. The shots have been missing so far, so everyone ignores it.

The close combat titan moves in on Raven, getting very lucky with its first hit, nearly killing her with a devastating 52 HP strike to the head. I guess she didn't wear her seat belt. Her armor is barely damaged, but she's badly wounded. She can get a few hits in, but her injuries give her a -40% chance to hit. Only one machine gun attack hits. She'll have to run the hell out of there now, at least until her injuries heal.

Kitcat provides a bit of cover fire for Raven as she flees, but doesn't do much damage. It's suicide running up to a close combat titan like that with guns blazing, so she'll just sit back and blast away.

Demeter manages to machine gun Raven as she flees, hitting her in the head again, but this time, the armor protects her.

Fox gets up, but Muz and Urist do a good job of hitting her badly in the process. The Gargoyle that Fox pilots is a close combat one too, with dual vibra claws.. inaccurate, but devastating when it does hit. Luckily, Urist is dodging all her blows.

Raven gets away from Demeter, but instead of running off the map, she just runs around in circles, distracting them. Kitcat is forced to move to engage Demeter up close, but since he's chasing around Raven, she gets to machine gun him up close without getting hurt.

After exchanging a few blows, Fox finally does hit Urist, and tears open a few pipes from the heat register. In revenge, Urist hits Fox hard in the left torso, disabling it and the left arm at once.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Demeter switches aim to Kitcat. Kitcat notices him sitting quietly there in advance, and makes a break for it. Demeter only gets a few bullets onto Kitcat's torso.

Muz hits Fox with a cold light gun to the groin lower torso. She keels over very quickly.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

While being chased by Demeter, Kitcat does a trick move and.. suddenly stops. Demeter races past her, giving Kitcat a few shots on his back. Too bad none of those shots actually hit. But Urist sees Demeter moving onto his tile, and switches target to him. Raven switches to the badly wounded Fox, who'd be a much easier target.

Sereena on the enemy Wasp continues to be ignored. Not only did she miss in all of her attacks, but she jumped right over everyone else.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Raven finally manages to disable Fox, despite her injuries. It allows everyone to switch focus to Demeter, who is badly damaging Urist.

Demeter gets a solid hit to Urist torso and... oh, shit.

Spoiler: oh shit (click to show/hide)

The force of the explosion utterly destroys and kills Urist, blows everyone off their feet (except Demeter!), and rips off a few limbs in the process. Kitcat is unhurt, but the titan's arm is ripped off and the explosion left her dizzy. Raven is knocked unconscious.

Muz switches focus to the remaining guy, engaging in a duel. Sereena gets a lucky punch to Muz's head, followed by another headshot with a AC12 cannon. Luckily Muz was wearing his seatbelt, unlike Raven, and wasn't as hurt.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Realizing the advantage they're in, the opponents offer a draw. But now, it was declined, to honor Urist's death.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Demeter replies by pointing his machine gun direct to Raven's head and blasting her full of holes.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Both remaining members of the squad exchange blows in a tense fight to the death. Demeter continues his standard tactic of blasting heads with machine guns, but Kitcat is persistent and calm, and continues fighting back. After about a minute of exchanging blows, Kitcat finally shoots Demeter hard in the leg, knocking him down and breaking it off.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Muz also gets a solid blow, disabling Sereena's center torso. Luckily, Sereena didn't have an engine stored in there. She ejects immediately, unable to protect herself.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

All in all, it was a Pyrrhic victory. A bit of experience was gained, but at the cost of two lives.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

We'll have to restock the ranks with another mechanic before moving forward. Or I suppose we could clone Raven again, but that's expensive

[Keita]

Out of interest, what are all the different types of XP?

[Zangi]

Out of interest, what are all the different types of XP?

Pilot, Combat and Other...  at least thats what I understand of it from my playings.

[Keita]

KK thanks.

[forsaken1111]

Put me on the waiting list plox.

Name: Nonce
Callsign: Sparks
Gender: Male
Race: Human
Weapon specialization: Energy
Manager or mechanic: Mechanic

[Zangi]

Name: Bob
Callsign: Builder
Gender: Android
Race: Android
Weapon specialization: Cannon
Manager or mechanic: Mechanic

Ifn you need a replacement.

[mrchinchin25]

RIP Urist, your deeds and the deeds of your ancestors will never be forgotten...

[Burnt Pies]

Noo, Catherine!

I am sad.


If she can be cloned again in the future, that'd be great. I understand she'll be at the back of the list for now.

[forsaken1111]

By the way, full game available for free here: http://www.matrixgames.com/products/237/downloads/Titans.of.Steel:.Warring.Suns

Surprisingly, this is legit.