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[Pandarsenic]

But we should research Magitek either way. (er, what's the correct spelling on that, anyway? "Magitek" or "Magitech"?) For now, we should start by reverse-engineering the T-Tank's hovertreads. Make designs for a light transport. We'll need it for moving many troops quickly, as well as trading things with villages we ally with rather than annex.

http://www.googlefight.com/index.php?lang=en_GB&word1=magitek&word2=magitech

Magitech wins by a small amount, but either is fine.

Research:  Light magitech vehicles.  Again, we're not really mobile if we're on foot.  Plus, even a couple simple buggies or technicals would help in combat quite a bit.


Squad C:  As suggested by Nirur:

I think we should try to establish friendly relations with them, rather then immediately trying to annex them. Give the same story as we gave to the other town, but be less aggressive with our diplomatic attempts. I don't see a problem with saying where we're from as a show of faith.

Mmkay, sounds good. I'll write the turn up when I'm less lazy. <.<

[Pandarsenic]

+5 Style: Magitech
+1 Doctrine: Superior Training
Level 1 Doctrine: Superior Training!
+40 Style: Magitech (Youuuuu rolled really well. 45 total gain gets you an APC, a light ATV with a mounted weapon, and the ability to salvage conventional vehicles for Magitech-worthy Parts [yes, ANOTHER resource. Parts come from Salvage directly but can be made in Factories if you need a lot.])



So while you were copying your schematics of the mana battery over, you realized something about this APC:

Why make the troops leave it? You leave the door on the left side and the storage space at the back, but on the right side you make small shutters that can open to reveal firing ports and slightly change the layout of the benches inside; it can still hold up to sixteen foot soldiers and their equipment as well as some 35 units of Food, Raw Materials, Resources, or Equipment. However, up to nine foot soldiers can fire out the right side when necessary. The door is already a weak point, so you decide not to aggravate that issue further. Then inspiration hits you again, and you put a heavy infantry weapon mount to the side; while the mana barrier is up, you can simply open the door and the (comfortably sitting) Machine Gunner (or user of whatever heavy weapons you later design) can mount his weapon, adjust it to his desired height, and fire as he wishes out the left side. A few cheap cords and straps make it possible (if not easy) for two non-mounted weapons to fire around it without risking being thrown from the vehicle during turns or when the kinetic dispersion is incomplete when hit by a heavy attack (read: when an explosion happens).

OoC: This is your first thing that gets a lot better based on the troops you put in it. It allows up to 8 Infantry-types (Infantry, Sergeants, Elites, future unlocks, etc.) to fire out of a 45-degree arc on the right side and 2 Infantry-types and 1 Heavy Weapons (units with the Heavy Weapons trait) to fire out the left side. There are accuracy penalties for firing while moving still, but since they get to use its defenses it's a very powerful thing, especially at this phase of the game.

Time for some more spriting to complete the update once I find out of patch delays in League of Legends are robbing me of my gold rank...

Edit: And the ATV/jeep thing.



Writeups on Parts Salvage and their stat blocks after I eat/shower.

[Pandarsenic]

The short bit is that [ERROR. TIME TRAVELER WARNING YOU THAT NUMBERS ARE CHANGED. SEE FUTUREPOST FOR DETAILS]

Anyway, super tired, real post tomorrow.

[Sean Mirrsen]

Would you like more elaborate drawings of the Awesome Personnel Carrier and All-Testosterone Vehicle? () Your sprites are a bit too blocky for my tastes.

Also, is there any particular reason why the ATV's weapon is side-mounted? I mean, like, technological limitations and such? No, I understand that the whole hovertread thing allows it to essentially be its own turret, but I'm not sure if there's any benefit to that design. Except maybe greater vertical aiming arc... for if/when we encounter enemy aircraft, I suppose. Or mole tanks, whichever is more probable.

[RAM]

It is long, because, well, aerodynamics and stuff, so sticking the guns along the sides lets it have more fire-power showing at one time, for much the same reasons as a tall-ship does. It is sort of a hybrid between an A.P.C. and a pill-box. It can carry people around and provide a safe place to shoot from. If it isn't safe then it isn't likely to be shooting... For now I think that the A.P.C. is excellent for our needs, in the long run I think that the A.T.V. would be a good base for foreseeable-future ground-based scouting...

[Sean Mirrsen]

Not sure where you think I brought length up, but anyway.

I hate to nerf our favorite combat vehicle, but there's a discrepancy between the T-Tank's Magic stat (what the hell is that used for, anyway? I thought it could be used for the Mana Cannon, but it isn't...) and the formula for said stat. Unless we have like 5 levels in Magitek, there's no way its Magic stat can be 30. It's more like 15.

edit: Oh, it's added to the defense value by the mana barrier. Pity. Well, the main point of the thing is negating armor-piercing anyway. 'Twould be fun if magic also applied to the Mana Cannon though, kinda like with the Mana Grenades.

[Sean Mirrsen]

Didn't feel like coloring anything, so just sketchy sketches this time. Drew the T-Tank again, closer to the source sprite this time.


I think I borked perspective on the APC... I also have no idea what the red-brown plates on the front are in Pandar's sprite, so I made some stuff up.

[Toaster]

One of those in a scout group would turn a fight like that first into a even more of a landslide.

I'm thinking the APC for nearby transport with decent chances of combat and a couple of the light vehicles for longer range scouting.

[Sean Mirrsen]

Got carried away by a little sketchin' inertia.


I'm pretty sure the arms are too long. Or the legs too short. Well, practice makes perfect.

[Armok]

Those sketches are totally sweet.

> Proposed vehicle: very low profile body, probably requiring the gunner to lie down, and shaped like a broad wedge to increase armor by deflecting shots upwards from one side. Weak and slow but omnidirectional propulsion letting the facing angle be independent of the motion. Weaponry consists of a row of machingun turrets (5 or 0 depending on size?) controlled by a single gunner with a mana interface, presumably with some extent of automation to help with controling so many at one.

[Sean Mirrsen]

A... weaponized hover-bobsled? Not sure it'd be good enough as a vehicle on its own. It'd have to be carried around by a bigger vehicle or kept in storage, because... seriously, have mercy on the pilot! It'd be used for base defense or big assaults on fortified positions. And in the latter case they'd probably have to be manned by pilots of Japanese descent, after a good lil' cup of sake.

Now, a weaponized hoverbike - THAT could be fun. The pilot wouldn't be lying down but sitting, the machine would have a slim profile coupled with heavy armor from the front and back, armed with maybe a pair of machineguns and/or a Mana Mortar in the back. Fast but relatively fragile, relying on heavy front/back armor and a mana barrier to survive engagements, which would be either the defensive "face the enemy and unload" or the hit'n'run "dash at the enemy firing/spin around/flee directly away until out of firing range", to minimize the time the weak broad sides are exposed to enemy fire.

[Taricus]

Actually, I'd say we do it more traditionally. The bike itself has no weapons, but the sidecar could have a pintle-mounted MG. This'll let the vehicle and it's pilots function at optimal levels.

[Sean Mirrsen]

The sidecar would more likely than not be a liability. A bike with a sidecar is inherently unbalanced (unless it has two sidecars, in which case you can just use an ATV), and the whole point of an attack hoverbike is being a cheap, ludicrously fast single-man scout vehicle. We could include a "gunner" in the back, who would control the weapons, but I'm not sure how much that would work with just the one/two weapons that'd be mounted on the bike. The only time I've seen that work was the two-seater Cyclotron from SWAT Kats.

The design I think of would be somewhat like this:

[Pandarsenic]

Your sprites are a bit too blocky for my tastes.

But... but I like the blocky. :<

Also, is there any particular reason why the ATV's weapon is side-mounted? I mean, like, technological limitations and such? No, I understand that the whole hovertread thing allows it to essentially be its own turret, but I'm not sure if there's any benefit to that design. Except maybe greater vertical aiming arc... for if/when we encounter enemy aircraft, I suppose. Or mole tanks, whichever is more probable.

Let's just say you'll be very sad if anyone ever shoots that ATV/jeep hybrid (bastard child) from above, because that top sheet of metal couldn't physically support the weight of a Thaumic Driver. For perspective, it seats precisely one person. Not even one person and a midget. One person. Behind him or her is a small space for up to 2 (yes, two) Equipment/Salvaged things, placed upon a small sheet separating the reactor (hope that it doesn't got shot from behind) which runs power to the three hovertreads - one under the main chassis in front (to leave room for a system that lets a person basically plug themselves into it, referenced in the stat block, and a large amount of sensor equipment) and two off to the sides (the big rectangle you can see, mirrored on the other side) because frankly there isn't room for them to be at all internalized. The Thaumic Drivers are basically welded to the sides next to the reactor, equal in height, and while its reactor doesn't let them hit terribly hard, they are vehicle weapons. The top could quite literally be taken off with no impairment of the functionality of the unit (and frankly, little loss of defensive value), save that it would no longer be self-contained against gasses and particles. Even if it could be mounted on top, the Thaumatank-MG has a driver, a gunner/info analyst (since managing the firing cycles on the Thaumic Drivers and mana cannon is basically the least demanding of those three jobs, his gets combined with the information-gathering systems with the addition of the MG), and a second gunner who manages the MG turret; the ATV has... a driver-gunner-info analyst. It's very much a scout vehicle with some minor combat abilities, not a combat vehicle that happens to be good for scouting. Your first real mass-production-capable vehicle with its own combat capabilities will come in the near future.

Also, and a heads up, Hovertread vehicles are able to move ridiculously fast in combat (25 move or a 27-range teleport on the Thaumatank, for instance - oh god I listed it as a free action, I'm going to fix that, it should be a move action - anyway, that would let a tank cross that first battlefield end-to-end in 2 and a third turns) but they have inertia - movespeed is subtracted by use of Movement. This means that your ATV, with a Movement stat of 10+10*Doctrine:Mobility, can move 30 distance - three whole range brackets for someone firing - in a single turn. It will, however, slide another 10 distance before it can stop (default slide for vehicles is 1/3) and incur a firing-on-the-move penalty if it's still sliding when you want it to shoot. Great for drive-by gunning, though.

Also Also, that bike design would totally work, Sean.

Also Also Also, while I get breakfast and such, you all should decide on names for the APC and ATV.

[Sean Mirrsen]

You mean "the" APC and ATV, or "the class/model" of APC and ATV?

If the latter, the ATV could be the "Paperback", owing to its superficially protective roof. The APC could be the "Thunderhead" - since it's a fast APC with serious combat ability, a combination of "thunderbolt" and "spearhead" would work for it.