Mecha Space Pirate Quest XV

That depends on how much the Knuckle Kaiser and Bluegills get damaged in upcoming battles. By the way, the Osano-Wo is literally a Morgan II Custom, while the Archen is quite similar on paper aside from wildly different weapon loadout and special systems.

You will have plenty of those, fret not.

You're three points shy of affording the ASP and both of the other sensor upgrades. You have 17 points banked (since the consensus was to keep the Morgan II and Warmouth), getting all three would cost 20 CP.

Lets just get the scanner then

Posting our mixtapes like always drive.google.com/file/d/0B6iimHE85EZZWjJCLXRLem1mQ2s/view?usp=drivesdk

ASP first then, since we already have full specs of the Tarrasque. Unless they've modified it while we weren't looking.

>Target Analyzer
I feel it's it pulls it's weight more than sensor range. Especially if we can fit Miles with the extra ranger. We'll be able to prioritize servos on non-stock mechs (aka bosses). Last time we already saw how amazing that would be by destroying the Morgan's missile pods on accident.

Range up is needed for better coordination.

Also, I just remembered that the skull brothers were talking about the captain looking for females if I recall. Likely to pilot the Tarrasque or for something. If we get a good disguise like a suit from a green skull we could likely sneak in with the Big Zam's 'proper' pilot.

That should have been SRA, not ASP.

Just realized there was a duplicate on that hears the real onedrive.google.com/file/d/0B6iimHE85EZZdTkwcHVxT2ZxWXc/view?usp=drivesdk

We can bring Fatime since she was originally going to pilot it

Things like this (and the fact that even Mega-Heavy Armor with SP 11 does NOT stop a 6K AP fist from doing at least 1 Kill of damage on its first hit) are why I almost suspect Roarke could solo everything.

That was a fantastically lucky series of rolls. Those weren't Missile Pods, by the way, which are a pack of 6K missiles. The Morgan 2 had three Fire-Linked Heavy Missiles like those the Bluegill can equip singly, with +2 WA and 12K damage.

Target Analyzer. Just a question but can it see things like if a weapon is twin linked? Just an afterthough from the Osano-Wo fight.

What makes you think we can trust her not to attack is with the Zam?

Hm. Fairly divided on the sensors, I see.

strawpoll.me/10156423

Our old semi-reliable standby will give us the answer, surely.

That was the idea. Either way we'll need to know the lay of the land and where they could store the thing as well.

Also, got a weird idea of Oda piloting the Knuckle Kaiser with the heavy flail to make it seem like we are on the field and far away from their operation. But yeah, should definetly keep the two mechs for some possible mech upgrades for our buddies. Give them more room to grow than their master harpies.

I'll hesitantly say that yes, yes it can.

>no option for neither
>no obligatory Magnetic Grapple Hook waifu option
Shit poll, dude.

We make her swear on her honor and her faith that she wnt foght us or pull any funny business at the exchange and we'll let her have better quarters and more freedom to roam the ship plus we'll look better in her eyea if we save the ship she cares about

As a side-note, Richard Thorslund is getting on my nerves with how irritating his Master Harpy is to stat. Missiles have weird rules in general, and the fact that as a secondary meleeist he should by rights have a handheld sword or mace backup to his plethora of rockets makes statting it a pain, but I'll get it done.

Mohammed's is easy because as long as he has a cannon and a sword he's set.

How about we, or one of our crewmen, goes with her when she hijacks the Tarrasque, so if she tries to kill us, she can be threatened into compliance.

Also, before we give the Tarrasque back or something, how about we strip it of nearly all of its critical components so none of its defensive or offensive systems work? Leave nothing but propulsion, use those parts to upgrade our mechs, and we can sell the thing back for goodwill or dosh.

Well, with the two mechs we got, it shouldn't be hard to put the missiles and stuff on his master harpy to the other one and having it's armor fitted with bits from whatever we can salvage.

I just want its projector field. That shit is intense.

I was thinking have us and the designer go with her, possible Karen too

Or howsabout we wait for what our team learns first? Instead of risking them outside their mechs.

Why would you put non combatants with her. She already said she knows her way around a mech. It would be safe to say she's got some basic combat training as well.

Would probably be best to just have Roarke and Fatima. Roarke can sweet talk and we can use simple facts and the like to get pass people who can tell if we are lying.

Wait, why exactly would we need to bring Fatima with us instead of any other female pilot?

Thats why were having them interrogate the Green Skulls

The doctor and Karen are incase the Green Skulls did something to the mech that could lock us out

Thats a big what if there and chances are they wouldn't want to mess with the machine too much. Besides, that opens up the issue of getting them out when things get heated or heavens forbid a hostage situation.

Do not throw civvies, especially our best specialists into the line of fire. If need be we could use the Betta to piggy back comms or something.

You can copy its systems without directly ripping them off the Tarrasque, you know. I'm keeping the projector field in mind as a future upgrade, along with something special that was hinted at in a very early thread and has been brought up multiple times since.

So can regular sensors pick up on non visual? Like if we LoS a mech by hiding it underground or behind a building. The target tracker would cut out?

Cant wait till we can finally buy the punch fists and I even got the perfect name for them, the Polaris system

By the way, a note about going to the asteroid with just one mech.

Your mechs, generally, have room for one pilot. They can fit a single passenger on their lap and take a penalty to all combat and piloting rolls, and maybe squeeze one or two more into the storage compartment (which is extremely uncomfortable and stuffy for anything more than a short jaunt). Battle mecha are not APCs, and not equipped to carry a party in any sort of comfort.

Pic related, not the S-Betta.

Why do you need a female pilot for the Tarrasque at all?

Do we even have space aboard the Rhinehawk if wanna keep the Tarrasque?

>Why do you need a female pilot for the Tarrasque at all?
Well, just about all our male pilots seem inexplicably melee-oriented.

Yes. Regular sensors are primarily visual-based. Let's say the Master Harpy Longshadow and the Osano-Wo are playing a rousing game of paintball. To avoid Miles' sadistic streak and sniper cannon, Yoritomo hides behind a big rock. With standard sensors, Miles wouldn't be able to spot him unless she moved and got LoS back. HOWEVER, if the Knuckle Kaiser with its ASP was watching, it would see the heat trails from the Osano-Wo's sensors go behind the asteroid, and also detect Yoritomo's lifesigns and the big metal lump of the Osano-Wo.

Then we better just go with Us and Fatima

As for the female pilot I think people just got confused about whh we wanted to take Fatima

No reason in particular
>Pic "unrelated"

It may be because I've mentioned Galbadie collecting girls with good HMIS compatibility repeatedly, and they're assuming that it's because he uses them as pilots. However, all of the Green Skulls' pilots you've encountered and heard the voices of so far have been male.

But why even take her at all?

Because she's familiar with the Tarrasque and can help take over it?

Win browny points with her so she will either betray her fiance when he double crosses us or at least talk him down, plus she is an and can do damage to the greenskulls while the rest of our aces are fighting

But why DO we need Fatima? Override codes aren't locked to her yet, since she hasn't been in it yet; and since she hasn't been in it yet, she won't be able to pilot it much better than any other notable pilot in our crew.

Unless you're trying to do it as a gesture of goodwill to get on her good side? In which case why not simply bribe her with the chance to get her hands on it and go wild on the Green Skulls that tried to take it from her, on the condition that she swears to leave it in our care after until such time as the exchange takes place - noting, as we do, that even with the mech, she wouldn't be able to leave the colony without an actual ship anyway?

Said what I was going to.

That make the Big Bomb The Big Zam plan viable then.

Make some noise in the colony where we have buildings. S-Betta gets a bomb from Karen or a harpy fusion core. Use it's stealth to place beside the Zam. Explode it and destroy the projector field in the process. Hopefully damage some of it's armour. Osano-Wo and Knuckle Kaiser come out from underground subway OR from roof of buildings. Hopefully we get initiative as the crew inside the Zam is disoriented from such a close range explosion. Use called melee shots to focus down the head. All the while S-Betta cloaks away and runs away to lose LoS. We can pump out 12 (8 punch, 4 sword) melee for every 2 shots the Zam has. That's enough to get rid of it's Head + Particle accelerator.

Not only are do we have amazing dodge chance but we can also parry twice the particle accelerator twice. It can't aim it's shot so we have a 1/6 chance to get hit in torso. Even then Osano-Wo and Kunckle Kaiser have enough time to LoS.

The goodwill thing was pretty much what I was going for and was what i said in

Some hours after sending out the Master Harpy Trio with a dozen Bluegills, you receive a call from the station. You've gathered the Cohens, Doctor Duncan Clancy, Avi, and Samantha in the mess hall for a strategy meeting, and also sent word to have Fatima brought out of her cell and escorted here. You've given explicit instructions to be polite, but firm with her, and under no circumstances to let her grab anyone's gun and go on a rampage.

Miles' cheeky voice resounds from your PC, "Not a single casualty, boss! You should've seen me! I'm unstoppable in this thing, a goddess of war! A! FUCKING! GODDESS~!" She whoops obnoxiously, several times, "There were a dozen of them, wonderful odds~"

Avi interrupts Miles' cackling, "Um, Admiral, I was on the radar earlier and I found that cruiser. Apparently it's parked on the other side of the asteroid directly across from us. I also asked Doctor Clancy if he had a blueprint of the mines, and put it into 3-D form for analysis." He coughs, "Also, I ran some numbers based on the sensor readings of the remaining Green Skulls ship. With the dozen on the colony accounted for, assuming standard twin-bay configuration of the enemy ship they can't have more than 36 machines left. 26 would be a more realistic estimate."

Avi displays a rotating view of the asteroid on his PC, a misshapen lump of rock with the tunnels and mines displayed as glowing blue lines, "So, you can see that there are a bunch of large valleys and canyons the Tarrasque could fit in...but almost all of them have these little side passages it's too big to get inside. Most of them could fit the Knuckle Kaiser or any of our smaller mecha..."

"Knuckle Kaiser?" Samantha frowns, then smacks her forehead, "Right, the Black Ogre. Knuckle Kaiser, that's kind of a fun name. I keep thinking of it as the Black Ogre, though, because that's the official military designation."

[Continued]

The Tarrasque isn't on the colony, it's on the asteroid, otherwise you would have run into it already. You probably knew that already, but people have been getting the colony and the actual mining asteroid it's floating next to confused.

Because she is likely the best option for piloting it in general. So long as she has the skills never being in the actual thing is not a issue. It wasn't for us and Jesus still blew off limbs with his new suit. By the sounds of it, the Zam is on par with her style and prefernces so it's a good fit.

She'd also work best for our espionage buddy since her beligerant nature makes her ideal for a prisoner/hostage. Threats that she'll never see her father again, having us keep an eye on her, and all that would work since she'd be that easy to rile up. Any of the others would likely have to feign it, but with her, we don't and thus any sort of trickery involving her won't be required.

In short, the prisoner of battle and pillage would make the best actor for a prisoner of battle and pillage.

After were done with Suleiman lets make sure to go visit Red Siren and make sure shes safe, plus find a wise old martial arts master to teach us and get up those hand to hand stats

Sooooo Master Asia?

I was thinking Mr Miyagi since were a walking 80s reference, but that works too

"Knuckle Kaiser, the autocrat of fists!" Karen explains, "Just like Roarke, it expresses its blazing, manly spirit through its powerful, shapely arms, and strong hands that can easily lift a woman's soul..."

"A-HEM." Avi interrupts while Samantha and Karen are nodding in dreamy agreement and staring at your arms.

The chubby helmsman grumbles and rubs his temples, "My point is, in terms of battle strength, we roughly outnumber the remaining enemy two to one. Um, apparently the whole botched scouting mission thing helped, apparently you and Captain Oda blew up a bunch of Harpies inadvertently when you cracked the airlock with fusion mines."

You remember the bag of reactor cores and Yoritomo gleefully perforating them with bullets, and decide that 'fusion mines' is a very kind way of putting it.

Fatima arrives, hmphing at her guards and the rather bewildered Yoritomo escorting her before taking a seat directly next to the head of the table. Next to you, in fact, which earns her a rather amused glance from Samantha and a slightly scary shiny-glasses glare from Karen.

Avi gestures to Doctor Clancy, "Now, why don't you tell the Admiral what you told me?"

The burly scientist starts to light up a cigarette, and wilts as Fatima glares full-strength at him, putting it away, "So, I looked at the specs of your machine, boss man. Seems I underestimated you a little. Now, I don't know who built it to exert such ridiculous PSI per finger..." Karen perks up and looks rather smug, "...Or who was responsible for the armor-piercing drills. Or these gripper things. Anyway, uh, if you can get through the shield projector, your Kaiser should be able to pierce the Tarrasque's armor. Somehow. Since when do pirates have this kind of thing anyway!?"

"Since ME." Karen replies, with a smugly kittenish expression.

"Right. Cornelius here has shown me around, and there are a lot of things you could do." He begins listing them.

[Continued]

So what do you suppose people will be calling us once rumor gets around that we CQCed the Tarrasque?

Fist of the (planet were from), The Man with the Iron Fists, Cool Hands Roarke, Knuckle King, the list is endless

"You could steal it. Those pirates might have had the access codes to get into it, but I don't think they have the time or the UJCIDF technical expertise to change the locks. You could blow a reactor core inside the cockpit, somehow, which would render it useless until repaired. You could have a Bluegill with a Heavy Missile or Impact Mace knock out the shield so that your heavy armor-piercing units could pummel it. You could set mines and damage its legs to keep it from flying or running. I personally like using Epoxy Guns to keep it from turning and aiming the main cannon at you while you jump it from behind...but I ain't in charge so I don't make those calls. What you do and how you do it is on you."

"I could pilot it." Fatima helpfully suggests, "I'm an excellent shot and have been using similar machines since I was a small girl. Mecha are a refined hobby and well-suited to noblewomen with strong dispositions."

"Don't shoot my Roarke!" Karen glowers at Fatima across the table, and Fatima glowers back.

"I would not! As it stands, I will be going home if Admiral Starwind is an honorable man, why risk that when I don't have a ship?"

"Because you're a crazy bitch." Karen mutters.

Fatima bristles, "At least I don't dress like a-"

"GIRLS. Strategy meeting. Tarrasque. Asteroid. Focus." You whack the table with your palm loudly enough to cut through their catfighting. "We're going to..."

>[We're going to...what, exactly?]

Roarke comes from the colonies of Io, one of Jupiter's moons and the seat of Bucephalus Heavy Industries.

Were gon a steal it, but bring the bomb as a back up if shit goes fubar

Then the Bull of Io would be the best nickname

By the way, if you take one mech and try to infiltrate (actually infiltrate on foot, not just sneak around with the S-Betta), keep in mind that there are between two dozen and three dozen Green Skulls Harpies left. Some might have stayed with the cruiser to deter boarders, but there are definitely some on the surface. Also while I hate to deter people's ideas, keep in mind that the Green Skulls' pilots probably know each other fairly well. A few dozen people you see every day isn't that far above the average number of kids in a classroom, and generally speaking you know when a new kid shows up.

Would the Betta be able to sneak in though

>but almost all of them have these little side passages it's too big to get inside.

I thought we didn't have any epoxy guns on our ship? Something about how we would have gotten them if we started with a gun focused mech.

I'm voting for the ambush. Preferably with the bomb that way we can take the shield down quicker.

Just to clarify if we hit the projector with any damage that can ovewhelm its auto-parry then it just dies? If that's the case then S-Betta swinging the mace with a sneak attack should be enough as well.

The tarrasque is going to be the biggest problem. If we can take it out or steal it from right under them, we could easily mop up the enemy. Fatima would be the best shot as it were for the machine, but we should go with her.

Any of the green skulls who were interogated, get their suits make them Roarke size and we could infiltrate the place. We can have Oda pilot the Knuckle Kaiser with the impact mace to serve as a focus for them along with our ship. So long as they assume we are on our ship, they will likely not focus inwards.

Of course, we could also use the tunnel system to try and sneak in, but that could end badly if they manage to sound the alarm.

Primary plan: Fatima comes with us in one of the mechs to try to steal the Tarrasque.

In the event things go south, or they're smart and have someone in the mech at all times, we have Sam cloak and lay mines to damage its legs (or, if that counts as an attack for the purposes of dropping her cloaking, just pass her an epoxy gun to bring along before deploying) while Miles stands by at maximum range to distract the pilot with a protracted sniper duel (where hopefully neither side will land a single hit).

Meanwhile, we sneak up using our ASP to maintain cover at all times and pummel its head in once its immobilized.

Bluegills and everyone else also on standby, in case things go really, really fucking south.

Lure it into a trap placed by the S-Betta to disable it in the upcoming battle?

Yes. The Betta would definitely be able to sneak in. However, that's one mech. If something goes wrong, you have one mech against the Tarrasque and however many Harpies there are.

If we can equip our bluegills with 5K swords. We can have them bum rush with us to take down the head. They won't die in a single turn since their torso needs 5 hits (With 360 AOE weapon) before it dies. They also have a shield to parry. They can retreat if they take too much damage. Not to mention ranged attacks can't actually "Aim" at servos. The numbers would force the Zam to use the 360 instead of the particle accelerator.

What I said was that if Roarke had been focused on guns his mech would have acquired a personal Epoxy Gun early.

Red Siren was kind enough to provide the standard Bluegill armaments she picked up along the with damaged Bluegills, to make up for the fact that most of them were missing limbs or heads when you received them. So yes, theoretically you could give every last Bluegill an Epoxy Gun.

If Sam can drop us off safely with no one seeing and we fet into the Zam then were golden

Lets not give him the mace since we have an mo for going with no weapons so that might tip them off, but lets make a prerecorded message to make them think were still there

Oh, I almost forgot to say. If you hit the I-Field with any damage that can overwhelm its auto-parry (7K+), the shield flickers out for two turns before it refreshes. To take the shield out permanently, you would need to do 6 Kills of damage to the shield system itself, contained within its Pod servo.

Okay so people can we just disable it? It seems a lot of us are getting too caught up in wanting to steal it where it may be affecting our plans.

How strong is a gamma bomb and how long does it take to make

Why the fuck are we trying to go in solo and steal it? They're obviously going to be guarding the prototype doombot, and they're obviously going to recognize us if we just put on a uniform and walk up like "HAI GUISE DON'T YOU LOVE BEING GREEN SKULLZ"

It's like you want us to get caught.

If we came at the Tarrasque from above or below wouldn't it be unable to shoot at us because it doesn't have arms to aim its weapon with?

I mean, it seems like a really shitty design to have the guns the way they are.

>A-Particle Screen Projector (Pod)
I-Field?
We can focus down the pod then. A single punch is enough to blow it up from us. We have 8 tries to kill it in a single turn. After that we can focus on the head. Just so Nobody gets one shotted by accident. Then the rest of our blue gills and lieutenants can "safely" jump in and deal with the Green Skull reinforcement.

Your right user, we should shave our hair off to not tip them off

150K and several days. You could also borrow a Strike Missile off the Yamato, since it's the same thing with a different name and a propulsion system.

Stealing it would be ideal, since it gives us an additional weapon. But we should be prepared to fall back to disabling it as a backup.

It has thrusters, and can perform sustained flight. Presumably this would allow it to aim in whatever direction it pleases as long as it is airborne, even if it takes forever to aim since it turns like a cargo freighter.

Could the Berreta theoretically cloak herself and the bomb then drop it on top of the Zam

>It has thrusters, and can perform sustained flight. Presumably this would allow it to aim in whatever direction it pleases as long as it is airborne, even if it takes forever to aim since it turns like a cargo freighter.

All you need to do is fly up and grab onto its legs or the top of it and it couldn't shoot you, and it couldn't maneuver to shoot you cause you're holding onto it.

Slang term for a force-field type shield system.

Also, no. The Pod rocks 11SP armor. The first hit would do 1 Kill, -1SP, the second hit would do 1 Kill, -1 SP, the third hit would do 2 Kills, -1 SP, and the fourth hit would do 2 Kills, -1 SP to finish the shield off. You could do it in a single turn, except that you have to move into melee range (or be sitting in a tunnel waiting to ambush it) and you'd better hope all four attacks hit...and even after that, it still has its particle accelerator cannons.

So Wong. Can the Tarrasque fire straight up and down?

A Strike Missile? God no, one of those things is bigger than the Betta!

It could, however, hug a net full of 'fusion mines' against its chest to cloak them and drop it on the Tarrasque's head.

This is true. Its defense consists primarily of sniping you while you're still far as fuck away. Pinning its legs would definitely be a viable tactic if we manage to close, as long as afterwards we can tear through its armor before its AoE chips us down.

Well that can take out the shield and give us a chance to run in and smash the cockpit

Yes. At least within the confines of a system where one hex is 50m wide. However, if it's grappled or immobilized, it can't turn to fire the main cannon in any direction but the one it's facing.

Too much power. We wouldn't get any CP from the Zam. No new tech to research and increase our current armoury. She should just bonk the Zam to take the shield down.

God damn. 11 SP too? Well. I think If we have Osano-Wo with us then it's fine for us to focus the Pod down. The particle cannon "CAN" kills us in a single turn. It'd have to get past our dodge/parry twice though. That's why I wanted our blue gills on top of the Zam with us. Force it to have more incentive to use the 360 weapon attack instead of the particle cannon. Since we have epoxy guns then even better. The Zam won't be able to aim at us if we flank it.

You don't have to do the pinning yourself, for once. After all, you have Bluegills with epoxy guns, and the Tarrasque pilot would need to roll Mecha Fighting at DC 18 (with a -7 penalty for the Tarrasque's clumsy bulk) to get free.

So if we grappled it from below it couldn't shoot us?

>Wide-Dispersal Particle Accelerator Defense System (Torso): Range 400m, WA+1, 4K, Wide Angle 360-degrees (hits all targets within range surrounding it), 39.9 CP, 18 Spaces, 2 tons
Somewhat less threatening, but still noteworthy, especially if we're considering bumrushing it with Bluegills.

Colossus Slayer. Leviathan Nemesis. Steel Scourge. Clawed Devil. The Kestrel's Iron Hound.

So, would it be correct to say that the general consensus (or at least enough support to avoid getting me lynched) is to cause a diversion to draw the Tarrasque into a kill zone, drop a bag of fusion mines on it from above with the S-Betta (which promptly flees while Samantha expends Luck to avoid any attacks from it) to take out the shield, then have your Bluegills shoot Epoxy Guns at it to keep it still with its main cannon facing away as the Knuckle Kaiser and Osano-Wo assault it from behind and tear at its armor?

If so, how many Bluegills do you want to bring? Once it's grappled, they'll engage with their maces and retreat if the 360-degree beamspam damages them enough to put their lives at risk.

But look at the picture of it. It literally can't shoot above of below it.

If you work ONLY with crunch instead of incorporating crunch and fluff you get some weird shit.

Blue Gills have nothing to fear. Can't really take them down lethally apart from two lucky crits on the torso.

3 hits on their head. 4 On their limbs. 5 On their torso. Not to mention they have 6 SP shields to parry with as well.