The Head Brainer cheerfully informs me that the Strix Zombies don't just have balloon tits, but actual, literal boob jugs filled with the poisonous bile they've been spewing at my troops.
This Temple raid goes over without any of our squishier members eating a bullet. Bezmenov manages to capture the Priest alive, while even Disc manages to overcome her frail human nature and take a two enemies alive. I'd still like to get her into some kind of better armor so she can participate more, but I guess its just not in the cards now. I must have really fucked up the research tree somewhere.
Hey, I'm just happy that mere humans are able to keep up in some manner. It's always a let-down when you have the option to use non-standard troops in a tactical game, but never really take them because your regular ones outclass them in every way.
The Lokk'Naars are for all intensive purposes, Short Stacks.
And immediately after they get our heavily-armed midgets rip-roaring drunk, one of them gets shot in the face on her first mission. These hazings are getting a little out of hand.
I'm getting to really despise Reaper Cavalry just because of how much of an inconvenience they are to deal with.
Interrogating that Reverend from the Boot Camp we took down two updates ago gives us an overview of the Star God's coding technology, which at this point we are absolutely nowhere near prepared to begin serious research on. I ask the Brainers to keep an eye out for anything we can use.
I somewhat recklessly engage this enemy scout over the water and set it to Davy Jones' Locker.
I'm determined to figure out why the Hell I can't manufacture or purchase even basic armor yet, so i start researching all of the random odds and ends items I've had sitting around the base starting with monster teeth. Meanwhile, my quest for better explosive weapons continues.
A full medical examination of the Lokk'Naar reveals that they are just as hyperactive and degenerate as our common Gals, though a bit more savage given their primitive environments. Speaking of degeneracy, I'm finally given a full report on the mysterious Doctor X, the woman in charge of the breeding program that created the original six Gals who escaped from an Academy Lab and triggered this whole saga. Its ultimately a little unclear just what Doctor X's research was aimed towards. Being a lowly file clerk before I was brought along for the ride, I also never met the "good" doctor myself either, so virtually nothing is known about her except what the Gals can recall. They seem to be rather hesitant to do so, likewise.
Doctor X is most likely named as a pun on the fact that this is an XCOM game. That said, there's also a beloved classic horror movie called Doctor X dating all the way back to 1942. Its notable for being one of the first horror movies in color and its been named as one of the loose inspirations for The Rocky Horror Picture Show. Given the tone of this mod it might be more than a coincidence, I dunno.
Our new Vulcan Battery absolutely shreds whatever was trying to get into the base this time.
Some miscellanious research finishes up. I'm not a fan of the way SMGs work in this game so the Linux SMG techs don't mean much to me except that I think they're pre-requisites to manufacturing our own, better weaponry. The background for the Heat Vision tech is, of course, from the first Predator movie.
We also get in touch with the Smugglers, which unlocks a giant pile of crap we can purchase from them.
Likewise, we also get in touch with the Ship Junkyard and unlock another pile of crap we can buy from them as well. I think its time for a Bootypedia entry cleanup.
Ship techs I haven't shown you the entries for. Some of these we've had unlocked for awhile and i just didn't notice. The name Pigeon for the AWACS style plane I think is a holdover from the Tech-Com mod that got copyright stomped.
I wanted to call attention to this one because, well, just look at it. I probably won't find a use for this one since riding naked into battle on the back of a giant hyena seems like a great way to get shot in the chest and killed instantly.
It took me a minute to figure out what the significance of the hyena was in particular. Its probably because hyenas are matriarchal in the wild with females being on average larger and more aggressive than males.
The Flask O' Acid sprite is lifted from Diablo 2, being the sprite for the Choking Gas Poison bottle.
The Laslock weapons are tempting to use but their ammunition restrictions make them rather unattractive for me right now.
I notice Electroflares are back and they suck even more now.
Two of the more important items we get from all this junk are the disposable LASS weapon which functions more or less like a modern day LAW rocket, and the Fusion Torch, which will be extremely important for certain missions later on down the line. One of which I've been avoiding research on for some time.
I spend some time applying the Personal Attention training to Witty Squid and the Nepotism attribute. I've decided that Witty will be the only one to receive Nepotism, since that makes sense with the story I've kind of set up here. The troops that get Personal Attention will be kind of all over the place as our Gals have an irritating habit of getting wounded all the time. It also makes the Gal inactive for a full six days with means sometimes its just not feasible to drop someone from the roster like that.
This simple Distress Call mission drove me absolutely insane. Two of those hoverdisk enemies were camped at the furthest possible range from our Gals and on top of that I kept getting missed shots until I was basically right on top of them. Half the hostages died from getting clubbed because it took so fucking long to kill the disks.
Moths is next in line for Personal Attention training since everyone ahead of her is fucked up. We also get what I think is our first disruptive Transmissions event.
Another bandit makes the mistake of crossing into our territory.
We research a conventional propeller aircraft that can be built from Necroplane parts that I'm honestly not super interested in. Additionally the Head Brainer consults me over this whole Shadow business where I'm forced to admit that reading Tarot cards doesn't qualify me as a warlock. Some of our new Lokk'Naar recruits, considered more knowledgeable in these matters, inform us that we might find some of the answers by looking over the Red Codex again. I get the Brainers started on this right away.
Fucking finally, I can't believe that's what's been holding up my armor tech this entire time.
I notice that since Disc is both a normie human and a woman that she qualifies for Peasant Militia Training, which I send her off to right away. By the time she gets back we should hopefully have a new suit of armor ready for her instead of that miserable Tac Vest she's been stuck with for the entire game. I suspect a rich kid is going to have a lot of trouble roughing it with a bunch of farmers for two weeks, but the Runts promise me they'll check up on here when they make supply runs every few days. After I agree to increase their vodka ration, anyway. Little bastards.
A Humanist Arsenal mission goes over very well. Overcast, Negev and Zvantastika are all doing very well for new recruits, though I'm a little concerned about how none of them are gaining carry weight very fast.
The Head Brainer irritates me a little by roping me into a drinking binge even though her department hasn't come up with anything new recently. Apparently the staff doesn't get along very well over there, so what else is new.
The Runts take the opportunity to rip the peasant village off during a storm, while the progress over at SKYNET continues along. I get the money together to get started on the Large Prison complex.
Another bad day for the Academy is another good day for us. I'll have to do an update on our slave population at some point since we're taking in about 3-4 new Slave Maids every time we face off with the Academy.
Also, give my titles a peek, I think I picked up Succubus a few updates ago. I wonder if it's bugged, because there's already a generic one for knockouts, and the text indicates that it's supposed to be for Charm damage, which isn't something we've been doing.
Sorry, forgot about this last update. No Succubus Condemnation, though you do have Demon of Love II.
Additionally, since Update 20 is on the horizon, I'm going to take this opportunity to declare that there will be a Roll Call interlude some time between this update and that one, which will include snapshots of people's current stat lines and a snapshot of what our slavery system looks like.
A rather scattershot collection of research completes, Very little of note. The Long Knife is of course an SS Ehrendolch (literally: SS honour dagger) named after the infamous Night of the Long Knives.
Chemical ammunition tech finishes up, though I've never been a big fan of it. Maybe one of our veteran players in the thread can give me some tips on where its best used.
The month ends, and I notice our maintenance costs are starting to overrun or earning from the protection racket. We have more than enough money squirreled away in physical form since I refuse to sell any of it unless I need it that minute to avoid those retarded events where the enemy steals your money. However, I don't want to rely on reserves fully so I'm probably going to have to look into a farming base or something at some point.
Whatever the Hell this is we waste it.
Moths completes her Personal Attention training under me, and I subsequently move on to Chuckles The Jester. Moths returns to the base just in time for a peasant harvest festival. Disc is among the workers that drop the food off. She seems to be holding up well though I could tell they're working her to the bone.
Our second Ratmen Cache mission goes down much like the first except nobody dies this time.
Moths and Dr. Ricearoni rather effortlessly take on this Temple of Sirius infiltration mission on their own.
Another ruins mission, this time instead of killing rats we're up against a new foe that still goes down pretty easily. Forte proves her background wasn't a load of shit by managing to take on three of them, alone, with no backup and somehow not get killed despite being wounded and basically unarmored.
Nope.
Are chem weapons any good against Zombies? We could use something with an extra punch to get rid of them honestly.
This mission manages to turn into a giant clusterfuck when Dr. Ricearoni gets stuck with a cattleprod and passes out. Fortunately Moths is able to neutralize most of the other enemies.
Kevlar Weaving finally finishes up, and once the runts get finished with our Air Muskets I'll be able to have them start on a roll of Kevlar so we can begin making some lighter armor. The Officer's Pistol research also reveals that the rank of the shooter increases the damage the weapon will do, which explains why one random enemy is usually able to wound our Gals with a fucking pistol.
The incredibly cult-like and aggressive Theban Hive is apparently an up and coming great power in this world. Its possible to Queen Bee of this society is one of our mysterious benefactors, posing as just another pawn in our protection racket, but its hard to tell at this point in time.
It looks like another important armor tech has been hiding at the bottom of the creature bin for some time.
Chuckles returns to Beauty Parlor, and i don't replace her on the training roster just yet since I'd rather have everyone present for the Roll Call post that's coming up.
Technology has really hit something of a slump recently. Though I do get a report on mysterious "Pink Deserts" that are bound to have anomalous effects on our Gals. As if the forests filled with hallucinogenic drugs aren't enough to worry about.
SKYNET gets attacked by something, fortunately its nothing the Vulcan batteries can't handle but the base is completely undefended so this was nearly a close call. I'll have to either start conducting operations from the base or get together a disposable team of peasants or something to prevent the base form being lost to some fluke incident like this.
Interrogation finishes up on that hostage we took from the ruins, a Tomb Runner in the vein of Tomb Raider, apparently.
The description for Dark Star makes me wonder if all this musing on how cloaking technology is supposedly impossible isn't a reference to how There Ain't No Stealth In Space, refering to how things like heat detection would make cloaking technology pointless and ineffective. Admittedly, this explanation doesn't really make sense in the atmosphere or on the ground, where a craft's heat signature could blend into the background, but, whatever.
I do plan on getting a second Blowfish together since we now have weapons we can actually engaged the enemy with down below.
This ancient log goes into great detail about the origins of the Academy. Osirion is a faction that first appears in XCOM Apocalypse as one of three gangs that are vying for control of the city's slums. Though Osirion doesn't explicitly work with the aliens, all three gangs are guaranteed to be infiltrated by the alien menace sooner or later as the game progresses. The XCOM Files operates on the idea that Osirion was always sympathetic to the aliens and also predates XCOM Apocalypse as some kind of Illuminati-like cult. People who have played The XCOM Files can maybe enlighten me on how much of this I'm getting right.
I should just stop posting, then you won't have a reason to give me notifications. To fill in a couple references you missed, the background image on the ancient log looks to be fan art of the EXALT organization, a secondary antagonist group of collaborators from the Enemy Within expansion for the 2012 XCOM reboot. Additionally, the Laslocks take their name and function from the Warhammer 40,000 universe, where they fill in as better-than-nothing weapons on backwater shitholes that can't even produce the standard-issue Guardsman Flashlight, which honestly feels pretty appropriate for the absolute state of Earth in this mod.
Also, >finally get out of sickbay
>go on a mission
>get set on fire
>back in sickbay for another 2 months le sigh
>Are chem weapons any good against Zombies? We could use something with an extra punch to get rid of them honestly.
How about this bad boy?
Zombies are one of the least threatening enemy types in the game, game practically gives you a free mission whenever they replace the normal enemy faction. Shotguns wreck their shit, even the most basic one will do wonders, and in case you haven't brought any you could just endlessly kite their sluggish asses while blasting with whatever you have(that is, if they even bother pursuing you -- in most cases they just keep walking back and forth as long as you're far enough).
If it's soldier zombies though... let's just say that your normal reaction to zombies would be perfectly appropriate then. I don't think they could appear this early in the campaign anyway, so you'll be fine.
>Are chem weapons any good against Zombies? We could use something with an extra punch to get rid of them honestly.
How about this bad boy? View attachment 3279108
Zombies are one of the least threatening enemy types in the game, game practically gives you a free mission whenever they replace the normal enemy faction. Shotguns wreck their shit, even the most basic one will do wonders, and in case you haven't brought any you could just endlessly kite their sluggish asses while blasting with whatever you have(that is, if they even bother pursuing you -- in most cases they just keep walking back and forth as long as you're far enough).
If it's soldier zombies though... let's just say that your normal reaction to zombies would be perfectly appropriate then. I don't think they could appear this early in the campaign anyway, so you'll be fine.
I've been using the Heavy Shotgun as my primary weapon for probably the majority of updates now, and while it will reliably down a zombie it takes about three shots to do it and about half the time they're simply knocked unconscious instead of outright killed. In any kind of location where zombies have cover or there's corners to go around they're probably going to win at melee most of the time, and one or two snap shots aren't usually good enough to deal with one that's rushing.
So far I've dealt with zombies by just camping in a firing line and hoping the Strix Zombie doesn't show up and make my life miserable. That didn't seem practical on the Prepper map since its a proper fortress and everything.
I am aware of soldier zombies though, and definitely not looking forward to them.
In regards to chem im pretty sure its super effective against flying enemies and one of the varieties of forcefield and its innate ability to chip away at armor can make it useful against heavily armored foes I guess.
Its sorta on that same tier as gas where it can be really good as a non-conventional damage type but some armors/enemies just ignore it or have high resist
Zombies are high health and low armor so high bullets * damage weapons like shotguns are the right idea. Fire or some other specialty weapon may work. Finding weapons is easy enough while armor is difficult so do make a concerted effort towards better armor.
Look up chainmail in the in game pedia and work backwards to see the tech you are missing. A workshop is needed which I believe you don't have built yet. After that try platemail. Consider working towards vehicles, other than the hyena. The armored car and tank especially.
The hyena turns damage to freshness loss which can be easier to manage. The high tu value can make them a melee or throwing monsters due to flat costs and high movement. As you suspect they get torn to shreds by explosions or high volume shots despite the extra hp. Hyenas are not really worth leaving three gals behind but you may quickly train one gal with them on easy missions. Vehicles in general are useful to minimize wounded and to get away with using smaller teams.
Armored cars are what you want for high priority targets such as stryx. Armor is a bit better than shielded chainmail but resistance to effects like choking or chem is great. Humans or smaller will have less health but otherwise it is a good role for them as well. Heroes and gnomes especially. They cover a large amount of ground for scouting and can do huge amounts of damage. A gnome in a car or tank will eventually be able to snipe with fully automatic weapons.
So far I've dealt with zombies by just camping in a firing line and hoping the Strix Zombie doesn't show up and make my life miserable. That didn't seem practical on the Prepper map since its a proper fortress and everything.
I guess you can just level the place with mortars or other explosives.
Automatic shotguns could also help since you would always be able to kill a zombie in one action as long you watch your TU.
I guess you can just level the place with mortars or other explosives.
Automatic shotguns could also help since you would always be able to kill a zombie in one action as long you watch your TU.
Actually not a bad idea I usually have a mortar specialist sit just outside the ship lobbing phosphorous or HE at anything dumb enough to be outside which can have interesting consequences on small flammable maps like rat villages
Actually not a bad idea I usually have a mortar specialist sit just outside the ship lobbing phosphorous or HE at anything dumb enough to be outside which can have interesting consequences on small flammable maps like rat villages
It's a little unfortunate that I can't seem to find any info on who actually did the UFO Aftershock soundtrack, I quite like that one.
First off I've got some crap left in the Bootypedia to unload so I don't have to shit up the next update with it.
I would be remiss if I didn't mention the Academy Hazmat suit's helmet is a deadringer for the helmet on the infamous Star Trek TOS spacesuits they only used once.
Speaking of underwater stuff, I rename the new Blowfish after another yellow vehicle.
Sweet Jesus Christ I'm referencing a Youtube video that used a clip from a TV show that was referencing yet another TV show. In a mod already filled with references.
This must be what its like writing for Family Guy.
Anyway, Disc is back from her training, but ultimately the Guerilla Gear is meant for Ubers only even though I don't see why it can't just be hemmed down to fit a regular person, so she's stuck with the Tac Vest for awhile longer.
I've had a Workshop for awhile now. I think what I've been missing this whole time was that damn Spider Silk and Chitin Plates research I kept ignoring because i thought animal parts were useless.
Anyway, on to what we're actually here for. It took me forever to put together the Awards bits for everyone so I'm gonna @ people for this. I also suspect a whole bunch of people don't even realize their characters have been recruited yet so I might as well make sure I guess. this thread does have a ridiculous turnover time between when people sign up and when they actually get added.
No faces because this was annoying enough to put together as it is. Also some of the award colors might be off because of that annoying problem where the PNG will be set to a lower color palette when I take the screenshot that I to this day cannot figure out the cause of.
@Neo-Holstien
Young Uber recruited from an aircar race finish line.
Lokk'Naars:
No @s on this one because I did that to you guys already last post and you haven't changed that much since then. If your character is missing an Awards sheet is because you haven't earned any yet, probably because i haven't sent you on any missions yet.
People L50 Forgot To Recruit Because He's A Terrible Leader:
@Polyboros2 I got confused about what you wanted, then when you confirmed you wanted a Gal I forgot to move you up to the top of the list. Damnit.
@JongleJingle I somehow missed you while I was naming the Lokk'Naar recruits. I said you're next up to recruit but that was before I rediscovered the fact that I skipped over Polyboros2 while making this post so uh, you're actually behind him.
I haven't come across any more Castaway Gals or Young Ubers in the mean time though.
Unrecruited Name Bank:
Polyboros2
JongleJingle
Hans
TerribleIdeasTM
White Devil
McMitch4kf
Mary the Goldsmith
Polyboros2
Gimmick Account
not william stenchever
Radical Centrist
Llama King
SailingTheSaltySeas
Plant Aqua Mammal
Fougaro
Zaryiu2
Hard Toothbrush
Womanhater69
R00T
Comstar
Agent of Z.O.G.
Slavery Update
If it makes anyone feel any better I headached for a little while about where I wanted to put the Slave Soldiers in relation to everyone else. I figure we'll go with a Last and Least sort of shtick since I like to lean more on the grimdark.
I've gone out of my way to avoid recruiting Workers, aside from the ones we got in that random event I ultimately ended up pinning on wtfneedsignup's character. I most often ransom Altar Boys instead of enslaving them and of course I so far will only enslave regular male slaves for Slave Soldiers and nothing else. Which means our slave population is almost exclusively female. Once I get that prison complex put together we'll get some gender equality up in this bitch.
@Mooger Meng
Former Guild Operator/Door Greeter Robot
I love the prominance of the heavy shotgun is so much there is a mastery ribbon behind it because surely they wouldnt make one for the over 9000 varieties of weapon out there
Those are known as imperial probes that investigate weird phenomena. You're usually meant to follow them to their origin point and theyll give you a random special mission. One of the ones I got was dark one related
I love the prominance of the heavy shotgun is so much there is a mastery ribbon behind it because surely they wouldnt make one for the over 9000 varieties of weapon out there
Man, seeing the graphs all together really hammers in how much better the Uber's stats are compared to a standard human's. Also, holy fuck those Lokk'Naars are squishy.
Then there's Disc, whose strict training regimen of "Holy fuck I don't wanna die!" has gotten her to the point where she can hack it with the titty supermutants. It's like seeing Krillin run around with a bunch of Saiyans, only instead of getting blown up he's sucker-punching people while the heavy hitters are going at it.
Man, seeing the graphs all together really hammers in how much better the Uber's stats are compared to a standard human's. Also, holy fuck those Lokk'Naars are squishy.
Part of it lies in that Ubers not only tend to have better starting stats, but the 20 armor they have even while nude massively increases longevity against anything that isn't explosive or a heavy weapon. Lokk'Naars, on the other hand, have overall lower starting stats, lower stat caps in many areas and have less armor than vanilla XCOM troopers starting out unless you give them Longcoats (9 front, side, rear, 6 under versus 12/8/5/2 for XCOM). That said, they do have better stamina and (like human troops) have higher freshness caps so you can send them out mission after mission with little difficulty, and their high reactions generally allow at least some chance of dodging attacks (not to mention blasting away whatever enters their field of view).
I don't even bother trying to take hostages, I just want out of this shithole as fast as possible.
Fortunately, its over quick.
The Christine shoots down another police cruiser. The Gals are getting restless, we need something bigger to chew on.
Well, that'll do.
I'm both relieved and a little disappointed to find this vessel is Guild operated. Disappointed because i was hoping for something different to research but relieved since I still sent a van full of rookies to deal with this mission.
The Gals are given the go-ahead, weapons free. I'm disinterested in capturing any Guild hostages at the moment unless they're Engineer,s since our Brainers are on the look out for them.
Zvantastika manages her second grenade kill.
Whatever this vessel is it can't be all that important, we're absolutely slaughtering the Guild forces protecting it. There must be better troops inside, surely.
Negev is stopped at the door by a Guild Security trooper. I'm still expecting troops with laser weapons to be waiting for us inside so I don't want her to just rush him. I have Bimborossa prepare he only grenade for a relay, but being a green rookie she flubs the throw. Since I'd rather not have Negev get shot or blown up, I have Overcast run up, grab the grenade, and toss it in.
Shit!
Overcast landed the throw, but she took a cannon round right on the chin. Surprisingly, despite not wearing proper armor, it only took off like a third of her health.
Aside from that little mishap, the Guild continues taking heavy losses. Still not a single laser shot yet.
An Engineer! I have the recently healed up Overcast move in to knock him out, which in retrospect was perhaps not the smartest move.
Ultimately the much heavier Negev needs to move up and club him. Engineers are surprisingly tough.
Bezmenov ultimately finishes off the last enemy, a Guild Air Sailor with a plain old pistol. Guess I could have tried to take more hostages after all. Fuck it, my Large Prison still isn't complete anyway.
This is apparently the first time I've actually bothered to research the Gun Almanac, so its full description page is shown here along with the free description I got from it.
These people look new, but lightly armed. Lets take in some hostages.
Shit, they might be government. Good thing I'm taking hostages instead of just shooting them all.
Things go pear-shaped rather fast. Witty and Peasant are both wounded advancing upon the enemy, they must have armor piercing rounds or something for their conventional weapons. I have Judge Dredd wipe out some random civilian lurking around for good measure.
Fuck's sake. Despite all my bellyaching about lasers last mission, there weren't any, but some glowie with a laser opens up and kills @Peasant on this one.
Disc, with her excellent vision, snipes an enemy without having to stray far from the Bhukankhe.
Witty knocks out the goon guarding that glowie bitch, and then kills the laser glowie with reaction fire. We don't even get the chance to see what Peasant's killer looked like.
What was thought to be a relatively easy mission has infact been a dismal failure, resulting in not only a negative score but the loss of one of our regular Gals. I chew Witty out for it in sickbay.
Meanwhile, a mission led by NerdShamer goes over pretty much flawlessly.
Research is nothing special, though the Reticulan Plasma Gun is fairly tempting, it critically lacks range which right now has been a major source of pain for our troops.
Ok, here we go, our first space mission.
Equipment is limited to zero-G only, and in general we can't use any of it anyway since the only usable armor we have that works in space are these Rescue Pods.
Normally, there's stars on these maps. It must be the night equivalent up here to get this completely black void.
There are roughly 30 Z levels in space, and you generally start somewhere in the middle with the space station being a few levels above or below you. The bottom Z level of space is invisible, and probably classified as a water tile or something because items dropped can't be recovered from it, at least I've never done so successfully. If you go unconscious in space, that's pretty much it. I spent an embarrassingly long amount of time searching for this station before I realized it was right next to the Bhukankhe.
Jesus!
The Gals return fire with their liquid nitrogen projectors, even the rookies.
Whoever they are they're getting one cold as fuck shower.
Eventually, the enemy runs away and heads inside. I don't remember the liquid nitro guns being this useless, maybe they've been nerfed. Anyway, I use the lull in combat to get my TicTac invasion force ready to bluepill this station.
The enemy reappears, and the Gals hose him down a second time.
Its hard to tell with all the shit in the way, but the enemy loses an arm. And lets out a zombie death cry upon doing so. Great. Because even in fucking space we can't avoid running into zombies.
Oh shit.
Chuckles takes a few swipes but is able to retreat and heal with the Rescue Pod's onboard medikit. After getting hit with a few more bursts the Zombie Trooper is finally down for the count. I have the Gals executed him on the ground too just in case, I can find a live on some other time.
Figger Naggot, Forever Sunrise and Pocket Dragoon are first inside the space station.
They also completely freeze over a regular zombie that steps out of one of the smaller rooms.
Chuckles and the rookies freeze the final enemy while the other Gals are busy searching the upper levels.
To my shock, we have no casualties. Additionally, I was wrong about the nitro projectors being nerfed. If anything, they've proven themselves surprisingly effective against zombies, especially the tough troopers. We should figure out if there's a way to use them on the ground.
Another suit of Peasant armor completes research, and yet again its still not as protective as the simple flak vest, much to my frustration. We're still working on the Chitin Plates that I assume are holding up my tech tree.
The Large Prison at SKYNET finally completes, and almost immediately comes under attack from who knows what. I believe the Large Prison also counts as a defensive emplacement but it never got the chance to open fire since the Vulcan battery wiped out the attacker. My plan in the short term is to transfer the Lokk'Naars over to SKYNET to act as its defensive team, and getting something new to be their primary craft.
Next Time: Depends, I have a few ideas to run by you guys.
Around this same time last year I ran a game of Victoria Revolutions and managed to do fairly well as Russia. I feel like the audience participation worked okay, at least in the early part of the game. Once it got into the later parts the choices people were given to vote on became slimmer as time went on and I began to run out of ways to give people options, which is just sort of how it goes with late stage Paradox games. I was thinking I could make it a yearly thing, take some time off from the XPiratez thread with its 400 hours of gameplay and do a little summer interlude.
Another idea I've been toying with is a good old-fashioned, oldstyle (emphasis on oldstyle) Crusader Kings 1 Succession game, which for the uninitiated is a game where you play until the current ruler character dies, then you hand the save file off to the next person. There's a fairly large number of problems in the way of this though. The game is old as fuck and extremely complicated and frustrating to play, even for a Paradox game. I had a bunch of ideas to mitigate this, like alternating the games between me and the other players (IE it would go Me -> First Volunteer -> Me Again -> Second Volunteer -> Me Again Again etc) so I could clean up any serious screwups the next player in line made.
Some of the humor would be in watching people inexperienced with the game fail so hard the entire country falls apart and I'm forced to win back the titles they lost. Once you reach a certain plateau of wealth and power in CK1 the game becomes trivially easy for those with autistic patience so having a reset button every couple of decades would help make the mind-numbing 400 years the game takes place over pass more easily. Additionally, a game of CK1 is never over until you absolutely lose your very last territory, so even if the worst happens you can always escape to some faraway island or obscure minor territory you inherited and continue the game in exile, slowly rebuilding from scratch.
The game is hard to learn though, and obviously the people who volunteer to play it would need to take their own screenshots. Though perhaps I could arrange them all for people if they need help with that. I'd be willing to do most of the tedious legwork on this one, if only to make people feel more comfortable with volunteering.
Another problem is that I would be interested in continuing the game all the way to HoI2, which is possible to some extent, and I thought I had the Paradox Curse beat only to have it take an unrelated save game I was screwing around with earlier. Still, even if the Paradox Curse limits the game to only CK1, it could be fun just to fuck around with.
That said, I'm well aware not everyone is as into autistic map-coloring simulators as I am, and I've already put this thread on hiatus once over the holidays, so I can understand if people think its stupid to do that again, and I'm perfectly willing to keep it going.
No vote or anything, I just want to hear how people feel and I'll figure out where to go from there. I won't make a decision sooner than same time next week though, and I'm gonna try to grind out the OFF thread a bit more in the mean time. Thanks for sticking with me this far, I know I've been pretty shit at keeping a schedule lately.
