Mecha Space Pirate Quest XLII

>>[Pay attention to the crowd]
Oda or Sam

>>[Pay attention to Fatima]
>>[Pay attention to the crowd]
We need to make sure Fatima's condition is stable and see if we can safely remove the circlet. Might have to call Karen to get a bed ready for her as well if anything bad happens for being away from her controller.

Also, are those Harpy Shinobis equipped with active cloaking and stealth? Because they are scary machines if true.

You're busy looking at Fatima. You do see Red Siren scooping the wedding gifts into her mech's cargo space, and you're both amused and unsurprised, but right now the woman in your arms has all of your attention as you scale the hatch and settle into your cockpit with Fatima on your lap. It's creepy, she isn't unconscious, and she's clearly awake and moving. You snap your fingers next to one of her ears and she tilts her head away from it. She moves to get more comfortable on you. Despite all of this, her eyes are blank, she doesn't utter a word or seem to be responding to anything other than base stimuli.

"I don't know if you can hear me right now, but it's going to be okay." You hug her. Her body isn't doll-stiff like a corpse's, it's warm and pliable and turns to fit more against your arm, but she doesn't look at your face or shove you or put her arms around you. She simply exists.

You want to tear the circlet off and snap it between your fingers, but despite that natural and wholesome urge you hold back. After all, you don't know what that would do to her.

"We'll fix this, I promise." Despite your innate implacability, your voice breaks a little, and you hug her tighter. She makes a small sound of discomfort, but doesn't move at all, "I swear, we'll get that thing off, and you'll be back to trying to bite my head off and insulting me in no time." You take a deep breath. You can do this later, you're still on the clock right now.

You check the Kaiser's sensors, and scan the crowd. Red Siren is just about done scandalizing the Martians, but in the eddies she creates through the crowd you spot pockets of calm. Spaces without movement, without disorder. Spaces where hard-faced men in desert robes are speaking into their PCs, their eyes flicking from one mech to another almost with disinterest. They're more noticeable because they almost invariably seem to have a rather larger than usual concentration of armed guards around them.

[Continued]

I wonder when were gonna end up wandering into the other Zabis

Fairchild mentioned the President and his Son, who was very diplomatic, That could be either the old man and garma, or space hitler original recipe.

We already met two. Gihren is probably sitting in a flagship somewhere being unkillable and Garma is probably head vulcaning people.

I hope Garma doesn't die in this one, he was pretty much the only really nice Zabi

Dozle wasnt that bad.

But we didn't get to see alot of him though, we really only saw him at Solomon which was maybe three episodes. He did seem like an alright guy though

Dozel and Garma are pretty much the good members since Dozel was more a family man and a proper soldier compared to his sister and brother. Oddly enough, the zabi members here seem to do rather well, so we might see them yet.

Hey Wong how are you handling mechs with more than one pilot?

I think I have said it before but going by Gihren's greed Dozel is actually the worst at fighting of the four siblings.

I wish I could read moon runes so I could play it easier, I have no idea what half the events happening even are

It's definitely time to go.

"Alright, everyone. Pack it up, we're leaving." Some part of you had hoped that Fatima would be piloting the Tarrasque, it makes your formation a little more awkward when you have to carry her and are being slowed down by controlling the Tarrasque.

With admirable teamwork, they're airborne in less than a minute, assuming a diamond formation around the Knuckle Kaiser. You focus on your radio around the tall, warm woman sitting as serenely as a statue in her lap.

...Which is why you don't see Rashad snap out of his apparent stupor and grab a guard's gun. You don't see him pretend to stumble and fire into the Jovian's stomach from such close range that the plasma from the energy pistol singes his fine shirt. You don't see him whip the guard's body between himself and the other guard. You don't see him shoot some of the guests in his frantic volley of shots before the second guard falls. Fairchild ducks behind the groundcar and pulls her sidearm, yelling into her PC for the specific mecha she had performing a holding pattern in reserve to get their asses over here. You definitely don't see Rashad running, not for one of the Scimitars or even the more expensive Tulwars, but for a long, low pillbug of a mech resembling a short, fat millipede with a smaller millipede running along either side of it. Underneath each smaller millipede is an armored tread and rows of retractable stake-like piston legs. At its very forward tip is a small, cylindrical turret with a narrow gun barrel. He thumbs the lock and hauls himself in while the various dignitaries' bodyguards are pushing their way through the panicking crowd to try and reach him.

[Continued, note that the baund doc's legs vary significantly from this mech's.]

Annnnd here's that SOUL tech Haman was talking about. REALLY should have made sure he was down for the count. Rookie mistake!

It gets easier as you play it and figure out what the buttons do. Also some dude on sufficient velocity did a lets play where he explains what all the moon runes are saying.

The oddly jointed, black-and-tan armor shifts, plates retracting on each of the side-millipedes so that a pair of short, stubby appendages tipped with massive autocannons can fold out. Fire and thunder tears through the parked Scimitars and tanks, explosions rocking the landing pad. More armor panels fold out, like the petals of a great steel lotus, on the backside of the mech's main body to reveal a massively complex thruster array, while a glow from beneath hints at further thrusters on the underside of the central millipede. Dazzling blue-white fire paints the landing pads as the lumbering mech lifts into the air, and rockets after the pirates at breakneck speed. It resembles nothing so much as a flying tank or some sort of assault ship.

As for you, you get the notice from Basil in the rear of your formation first.

"Pursuers, sah. Just the one for the nonce, it's a big thing, coming in at 216 klicks-per-hour, looks like it came from the wedding." The old man's precisely clipped voice alerts you.

You grunt in acknowledgment. You expected Scimitars, which means you expected there would be mecha there that could match your speed...but Scimitars are hardly something you would describe as 'a big thing'. You check your sensors, and whistle. Whatever is behind you, it has a powerplant on the same scale if not larger than the Knuckle Kaiser's. It's likely massing nearly as big as the Tarrasque, in fact.

It's not within visual range yet, you still have time to plan and act.

Or so you think, because next you get a message from Red Siren, "We have inbound Scimitars to the North-Northwest, coming in fast."

>[Send Fatima ahead with the others to keep the Scimitars off the one carrying her, engage Rashad solo]
>[Fight all of them at once with your whole formation]

>>[Send Fatima ahead with the others to keep the Scimitars off the one carrying her, engage Rashad solo]

It'll be easier to have the rest of the team kill the scimitars while we fight the big guy

>>[Send Fatima ahead with the others to keep the Scimitars off the one carrying her, engage Rashad solo]

Hmmm.. this is going be bad either way. If Basil has a few missiles, use one now to set up cover and then split them up. That machine seems to be built for multiple foes and likely has some of the same tricks as the Tarrasque.

>[Send Fatima ahead with the others to keep the Scimitars off the one carrying her, engage Rashad solo]

Can we get a scan of the machine once it's close?

and by missile I mean the smoke/scatter ones. They last a few turns and it would cut off the machine's view of us.. while we can see it clearly thanks to our better sensors.

Yes, although it doesn't have its points cost listed because I fucked up and lost the finished version of it and had to hastily remake it from memory.

Then Have Basil throw it behind the group by a bit, then rush into it for cover and ambush. That cannon is going to be the main problem.

Hey Wong, you said something about making a Jovian flag right? What were you expecting to be in it?

You think for a moment, and come up with a plan. You have no idea what this thing's capabilities are yet...but you have a plan.

"Basil, I need three of your grenades, the ones that spew out all that smoke and metallic chaff Cornelius came up with."

There's silence over the comms for a moment, Rosita speaks first, "Roarke, you're using something besides your fists?"

"No time to argue, everybody land, the control is portable and I can stick it on the Archen. One of you is carrying Fatima."

Your four mecha land, kicking up huge clouds of crimson dust. You hand her off as swiftly and gently as possible, and accept three large, flattened discs of metal from a belt on Basil's Warmouth. "I'm counting on you three. Take care of the Scimitars, get back to within visual range of our own flyers and call in to Karen for support. I'll handle this one."

"Aniki, you can't possibly go into battle alone. I'll stay with you and fight by your side." The Osano-Wo draws its swords in a flourish, the edges glowing red as Oda activates them.

"I can and I will. I came here to save Fatima, not lose one of you. I'll be back shortly." You grin at them over vidcomms, "If more Martians show up, I'll call Samantha and have her activate the spoofer she left on the satellite, that should distract them."

"Is there any point in arguing with you?" Rosita pouts, looking both worried and upset.

"Not at all, China Girl. Just get Fatima to the transport ship quickly, and I'll try to hurry up." You wink at her, and she nods.

Basil, holding onto Fatima, nods grimly, "Good luck, sah. Jove and Allah smile on you." He fires up the thrusters on his mech, prompting the other two to do the same. After some fiddling with the control, Red Siren gets the Tarrasque activated too. You watch them fly away with a sigh, turning the Kaiser around to see the approaching black speck on the horizon.

[Continued]

Cue to roarke missing with the grenades totally.

The smoke on these should last for thirty seconds, and the chaff will disperse beam weaponry. No matter what, they'll at least block line of sight. You may not know how to throw the things very well, but you can activate and drop one.

Whoever the pilot is, he's experienced enough not to waste his time firing at you from this distance. Of course, that also implies he doesn't have a beam weapon that has effectively unlimited ammunition due to drawing off the mech's microfusion generator. The flight of the enemy mech is hurtling, barely controlled, it doesn't seem to have wings and is therefore flying like a comet in a straight line.

When it's half a kilometer away, you activate the first grenade, smoke and gleaming shards of metal exploding outward in a sphere 150m wide. At that moment, the comms crackle.

"STARWIND! Where are you, Starwind? I know you're here, you treacherous dog!" Bullets cut through the smoke, huge shells like those on Oda's customized gun, but he can't see you yet and you can see him.

His mech is bizarre. Long and low, but with your ASP to pierce the smoke and your mech's advanced analysis systems you're able to get a sense of it. The sluglike main form you're seeing is created by a shell of armor plates over the main mech, which more closely resembles a stick insect. A large epoxy gun tips the turret where a head would be on a normal mech at the very front, and you see the armor plates fold away from the main frame as it leaves its aircraft form. Although the thrusters and legs remain unchanged, the torso has more range of movement with the armor folded back into a series of mobile attack-deflecting fins, while four spindly arms tipped with curved plasma blades fold out like the joints of an umbrella.

[Continued with stats]

Khanda Rashad Custom

Medium Heavy Torso: C/S/K 16, 8 tons
Medium Weight Head Turret: C/S/K 6, 3 tons
Heavy Striker Left Arm 1: C/S/K 6, 2.5 tons
Heavy Striker Left Arm 2: C/S/K 6, 2.5 tons
Heavy Striker Right Arm 1: C/S/K 6, 2.5 tons
Heavy Striker Right Arm 2: C/S/K 6, 2.5 tons
Light Heavy Left Leg: C/S/K 8, 3.5 tons
Light Heavy Right Leg: C/S/K 8, 3.5 tons
Armored Heavy Pod: CP 9, 18 Spaces

Armor: Officer's Light Heavy (7 SP, 10.5 CP, 3.5 tons) on all locations, does not ablate from damage caused by attacks dealing less than 4 Kills.

Main Sensors (Head): 4 CP, 1 Space, 2 Kills, 1 ton
Backup Sensors (Torso): 2 CP, 2 Spaces, 2 Kills, 1 ton

Options: Torso Cockpit with Environment Pod (2 CP, 2 Spaces), Torso Storage Module (1 CP, 1 Space), Liftwire (0.3 CP), Spotlights (0.2 CP), Interservo Melee Weapon Link (4 Beam Sabers 21 CP), Interservo Weapons Linkage (Custom Heavy Autocannons 3 CP), Deluxe Anti-Theft Lock (0.4 CP), Stereo (0.1 CP)

[1/2]

Armament:
[Arm-Mounted] Beam Saber x4 (Stats show an individual sword): WA +1, 7K (only 2K of structure), EMW (treats SP as 4 less than usual), 6 CP, 6 Spaces, 1 ton
[Leg-Mounted] Custom Heavy Autocannon x2 (Stats show an individual cannon): Range 350m, WA -1, 6K, BV 4, Ammo 10 bursts, Reloads 3, 17 CP, 8 Spaces, 3 tons
[Head-Mounted] Custom Epoxy Gun: Range 250m, WA +2, No damage but a successful hit counts as a Grapple with a DC of 18 to beat, 6 Kills of structure, Ammo 3, 13 CP, 5 Spaces, 3 tons
[Torso-Mounted] Active Shield: DA 0, SP 8, 18 CP, 9 Spaces, 4 tons

Thrusters & Speed: It has both Medium Weight Wheels and Treads. The wheels have 3K per leg, the Treads 6K per leg. Together they cost 18 CP and weigh 9 tons, but remove non-aquatic terrain penalties and add +100 meters per turn. Moves 200 meters per turn on land. As for its thrusters, it has 28 spaces worth in the Pod, 2 in the Torso, allowing it to move 300 meters per turn in flight.
Jet Mode: Allows the Khanda to take the form of a mechafighter (costs 0.3 multiplied by the base CP of the mech). This doubles the flight MA, prevents the use of handheld weapons (if the Khanda had hands), and inflicts -2 MV. It takes one Action to transform.

Total Weight: 87.5 tons before Weight Efficiency to reduce it to 59.5 tons

Rolled 3 + 10 (1d10 + 10)

Let's see if Rashad can see you.

Welp.
Good thing hes rich I guess because this thing must cost a fucking bomb.

>Khanda Rashad Custom
...thats not good. For it to have a custom means there is a standard variant. By the body alone it's incredibly heavy and-
>87.5 tons before Weight Efficiency to reduce it to 59.5 tons
And thats about 56 cp worth of weight loss alone. Dear god this thing is nuts. Taking out it's head seems the most viable option since it removes it's glue gun and gives it a -2 to hit us, but damned if this is a mech thats probably in the 400s.

Makes you want to stat something other than supposed grunts for once.

Yup. Though the big question is how skilled a pilot he is. thats the same penalty we are taking weight wise, but if he's around a 7, maybe 6, we could beat him down. HOWEVER, if he uses those swords we MUST put luck into dodging that shit! Since they are all servo linked, they will have one dice roll. Even using our shields might not do much with that barrage.

And he cannot. Which means that you have initiative. He's 100m away, at the very edge of the cloud of smoke. You could get there in one action with a dropkick charge and still attack with the second action, if you like. You should also decide where you're attacking with your other action. If the Khanda loses its pod, it can no longer fly, although since it has more dakka than you that doesn't hinder it so much unless you choose to flee and leave it there. If the Khanda loses its legs, it not only loses its ability to travel via its treads, it also loses the heavy autocannons. The arms, obviously, hold its beam sabers. The head has the main sensors and an epoxy gun, although Roarke can beat a DC of 18 almost effortlessly to get free if he spends an action on it.

This is a pretty extreme customization. Normal Khandas are naturally lighter (and only have two arms), slower in the air, but also don't have the Weight Efficiency Rashad's does. He's the sort of person to get SOUL tech from Project Skywalker and immediately slap ALL of it on his own gloating chariot regardless of cost.

Dropkick to his head and then ATATATAT to finish the servo off

A man after my own heart.

A drop kick to the head followed by a flurry of blows to it might be the best idea right now. With that heavy armor and the active shield(which we can punch through luckily), attacking it's arms and legs will take a good while and it's chest, while heavy, can be taken out with concentrated effort.

Always debuff the boss.

sounds like plan, although if we punched the pod out of existence we would be punching him out of the air

Keep in mind that dropkicks automatically hit the TORSO, and can't be aimed at other servos. The one exception was Caesar using his lance charge to remove Mohammed's arm because the alternative was Caesar's lance removing kebab entirely.

Not really much of an advantage if we aim to kill him seeing as we need to be in his face to hurt him.

However, if you land both punches, that would definitely destroy his head. Do you want to spend two luck apiece on your punches?

Fine

Well, a free softener/possible crit is always nice and it removes his active shield block for the round if it hits. Considering it's a 8 pointer, two actions worth of hits to it would destroy it full.. and we still half it thanks to armor piercing. Hell, give me a bit and I'll see how many hits it take to get to the center of the Rashad pop.

Thats fine. That head must go and it certainly lowers the chances of him hitting us for the rest of the battle.

Oh, right. Active shields automatically parry the first attack made per round, not the first hit. However, you still roll attack and he still gets a dodge roll, if he successfully dodges it his shield won't be damaged but its autoparry for the round will nonetheless be used up. That's the only way to keep Active Shields from just being destroyed in a few rounds.

Give me 1d10+14s, I'll manually apply the -2 to the first one and +2 to the other two.

Rolled 8 + 14 (1d10 + 14)

Time to remove kebab

Rolled 2 + 14 (1d10 + 14)

go dice go

Rolled 8 + 14 (1d10 + 14)

I WANT YOUR HEAD.

Rolled 1, 7, 5 = 13 (3d10)

+12 to all.

Channel your inner Serbian Roarke

Wut? Did it eat my roll?
Meh, I'm moving back to my laptop

Rolled 7 (1d10)

And I need a 1d10+13, first come first served.

Rolled 6 + 13 (1d10 + 13)

I got you

Rolled 10 + 13 (1d10 + 13)

Got you covered chief.

Rolled 10 + 13 (1d10 + 13)

Rolled 5 + 13 (1d10 + 13)

Remove kebab

Thunder bird post our mixtape

Here you go user, how about this for the fight
youtube.com/watch?v=v--IqqusnNQ

I just want to know lads
Why is this here and not ?
No h8

Of course I forgot to link it

drive.google.com/open?id=0B6iimHE85EZZZjRoaWVwQ3U2ZFk

Works for me Thunderbird

..Welp, whatever these rolls are used for, they are going to make someone's day sad.

Rolled 6 + 12 (1d10 + 12)

His mech may be bigger than yours, but you're Roarke fucking Starwind and you don't take shit from little shits like Rashad.

You come barreling out of the fog like a demon, feetfirst. The jointed fins of armor plating fold in front of the Khanda Custom's body, blocking your blow, but the sheer force of the Knuckle Kaiser's charge chips one of the fins and slams it against the sticklike torso of the Martian mech hard enough to dent the plating (-1 SP to both the shield and the torso armor). Your southpaw haymaker misses its turret-head, but your right cross strikes true, metal shattering with a gritty squeal that's clearly audible in this atmosphere-rich planetary environment (-1 armor SP on the head, -4K, leaving the head with 2K). The Kaiser's visor pops open, baring a grin that matches your own, and you hear him swearing madly over the comms, shaking so badly he can't react as quickly as he normally would. Nonetheless, his cannons spray bullets at you, albeit at close range.

>[FEED ME d10+14s! Also, you won initiative, intimidated him out of one of his Actions, and after resolving his burst fire it'll be your turn again. I'm assuming you're continuing to punch at the head, but if that gets destroyed what will you aim for next?]

Rolled 4 + 14 (1d10 + 14)

Rolled 5 + 14 (1d10 + 14)

Rolled 1 + 14 (1d10 + 14)

lets do this thing

Rolled 1, 2 = 3 (2d10)

+12 both, you still have two more punches.

Another paint-scraping dodge for Roarke Starwind.

Rolled 7 + 14 (1d10 + 14)

some more dice?

Rolled 3 + 14 (1d10 + 14)

Time to channel our Kenshiro

Rolled 5 + 14 (1d10 + 14)

Torso should be next. The ammount of hits equired are not bad and there is no point in dismantling him with so many limbs.

Rolled 5 + 14 (1d10 + 14)

One thing I've noticed is that narrow fights in this system come more from near misses rather than both parties being pretty fucked up by the end of it, because it only takes a few bad hits before you're crippled and the fight goes onesided. Like, looking back on past threads, there have been a few fights that would have been completely turned around if the enemy just landed a single hit but instead their attack roll tied with our defense roll and they got fucked. It kind of reminds me of L5R that way, honestly, where one hit can really determine the course of the fight.

...shit, even with the 1 we still hit him, Dude has Luck 1 by the looks of it.

Rolled 4, 7 = 11 (2d10)

+12 to both.

call it karma for him being an utter dickwaffle.

So are we going to be able to loot this beast or is it too heavy to run away with?

Well, compared to GGG and it's more super robot build, Mekton is more like macross and gundam. Mobility is your friend and a ace in a machine that utilizes his aceness will be horrifying to deal with. Likewise, luck makes risky rolls safe and can turn a sudden missile barrage into GLORIOUS SAKURA FIREWORKS.

Were pirates user, of course were looting this thing

Its because we need to TAKE BACK THE LOVE youtube.com/watch?v=wAqLie4EgUc

>GLORIOUS HANABI FIREWORKS
FTFY, filthy Gaijin

When no one was looking, Roarke Starwind scavanged 4 arm servos. Thats four arm servos. 04. Thats as many as 2 2s, and thats terrible.

Rolled 9, 9 = 18 (2d10)

Whoops, forgot his normal parries. First one is versus 15, second versus 21, +12 to both.

so that shield is at half health of 4 SP. Just need to scrape 1 kill with each hit and we are golden. Sturdy little bastard.

Rolled 8, 3 = 11 (2d10)

First blow is autoparried, but hits his shield. Another -1 SP for the shield (reducing it to 6SP), -1 SP and -1K for his Torso, reducing it to 5SP, 15K

The second blow is parried normally. Another -1 SP for his shield (reducing it to 5SP), -1 SP, -2 K for his Torso, reducing it to 4 SP, 13K.

The third blow, he dodges.

The fourth blow is also parried normally. -1 SP for his shield, again (reducing it to 4 SP), -1 SP and -3K for his Torso, reducing it to 3 SP, 10K.

Roarke Starwind bringing the hammer down even without scoring a direct hit. Writing it up now, but you might want to roll 1d10+14s to dodge his attacks meanwhile.

Still at +12 because his head remains partially intact.

Rolled 3 + 14 (1d10 + 14)

Probably another close dodge

Rolled 8 + 14 (1d10 + 14)

Rolled 7 + 14 (1d10 + 14)

Dodge!

Rolled 8 + 14 (1d10 + 14)

I thought we were destroying his head first? First head then torso. Add a bit of luck if need be.

Rolled 3 + 14 (1d10 + 14)

Yeah I thought it was head first too.

You're trying to, but when a shield parries a blow but doesn't entirely stop it the spillover goes into the servo holding the shield, in this case his mech's torso.

I wonder what Doan would think of Roarke