Turn 53 - From Soho Down To Brighton
You get a memo from Jeremy, you have 5 current units that they would like to upgrade to the new Medium Power Armor, specifically the two new Assault Regiments and the 3 remaining Armored Cavalry Regiments, the total cost would be a nice round $72,000. You have to do some digging and determine that this includes the expenses for the DURF facility itself.
[] | Upgrade Now |
- Will cost $72,000 and tie up the DURF for the rest of this turn on Medium Power Armor
- Potential DURF upgrades this turn
|
[] | Hold off |
- No upgrades, leaves the DURF free
- Potential DURF upgrades this turn
|
You sign off on various designs, leaving the internal design staff grumbling a little as you source everything from Majeure Electrique. You evidently are frustrating them, as when they focus on maximizing performance you always go with cost, and when they focus on cost you go with performance. Good, keeps them on their toes.
Several days later Jeremy comes into your office, now on crutches rather than in the medical chair as he adjusts to his new legs. “Well, I’m still not cleared for piloting, but we have a new mech which has allowed us to reconstitute the Light Horse Regiments as a ‘lighter’ counterpart to the Armored Cavalry Regiments.” he passes a datapad over for you to look at. “Summary, another quad, with a 5 pack LRM launcher in the left torso, an enhanced PPC in the right, extended range 5cm lasers in each torso, and a TAG. Well armored for a light mech, with a good solid turn of speed. We’re calling it the
Kavallerie, in keeping with the
Soldatin theme of our heavy mechs. We weren’t able to fit an AMS system, but even with CASE the risk of ammunition cook-offs was deemed too high to sacrifice anything for it.”
Name | Cost | Materials | HP | A/D | Specials |
Kavallerie Light Cavalry Mech | 415.54 | ES, DHS | 24 | 24 | |
“We’re going to be organizing these 3 to 1 with our existing
Orb Weaver design. All four are capable of supporting power armored infantry, and our simulations show that the unit should be able to match up with Drac
Jenners quite comfortably. The new Light Horse Battalion set would be 2 companies of these mechs in that configuration, and 1 Armored Cavalry Command Company, while the Regiment will be three such battalions.” Jeremy shrugs slightly. “But that brings us to another question.”
“Yes?” you ask, as he takes out a small stack of datapads.
“Simply, we have a total of thirty six surviving Mechwarriors from 1st and 3rd Armored Division who are fit to return to the cockpit… eventually.” he says with a grimace. “This includes myself and al-Aziz, which leaves 34. All of them have indicated that they wish to return to the front lines, but history shows that that may not be the wisest course of action.”
He takes a deep breath. “I spoke with Sarah about this, and she brought me the relevant information. Back in the Second World War on Old Terra, most of the combatants kept their most experienced and effective troops at the front line, reasoning that their skills and abilities gave them an edge in battle. One, however, very pointedly did the opposite. As soon as any of their people got sufficiently experienced, either via kills for fighter pilots, missions for bomber pilots, or time in theater for everybody else, they’d get rotated back to training positions. As a consequence, they were able to pass on their experience to the latest troops heading to the front, increasing their effectiveness. Over time, this proved to be the far wiser course of action.”
He checks his notes. “This won’t be popular among the troops, Mom, I know that, but I would like to institute this here, with us. Take those Mechwarriors, and instead of assigning them to 1st or 3rd Armored send them to the Aerie, not as part of the Cadre, but rather to teach.”
[] | Just do it |
- -1 successes required to promote a unit from Veteran to Crack
- -1 successes required to promote a unit from Crack to Elite
- -5 Approval Change
|
[] | Don’t do it | |
Parliament is being very very quiet. Which is a good thing. No actual members of either the Chamber of Delegates or Imperial Senate had been directly involved in the oligarchs criminal activities, but too many had benefited from favorable coverage by the media conglomerates that are now in the process of collapsing, and were rather desperately keeping their heads down in the hopes that the voters will forget about it when elections happen next year.
The Eldest is quite amused at this, and is taking the opportunity to troll the hell out of his colleagues by forcing them to vote on all sorts of measures they’d normally shrug off as unimportant or beneath their dignity.
Ahh, well, it keeps the (very) big guy happy, and means less paperwork for you, so you’re happy.
Isoroku has returned from his trip to New Rasalhague, delivering the three salvaged
Achilles. He brings with him a request from the New Rasalhaguians. They have the schematics for the
Shilone but lack the facilities to produce them, thus they are offering a rather lucrative production contract for up to 36
Shilones a year.
These ASFs use no strategic materials or advanced equipment and there are a number of commercial operations who are interested in taking the contract.
[] | Arsenal of FREEDOM! |
- Improves relations with NRR
- +1 free success on Imperial Economy rolls
|
[] | Not worth it |
- Worsens relations with NRR
|
Unicorn heads back to Calliope with an expanded research and survey team, along with a diplomatic team to make initial contact with the Steam Age settlement on Calliope IV. You have to decide the basic posture of the diplomats, since you won’t have any real way to communicate with them in real time until you’ve developed HPGs.
Isoroku sets several possibilities before you, which will serve as the basic instructions to the ambassadors you send.
Ultimately it all comes down to a simple question: What is your ultimate goal? Assimilation? In which case your diplomats would be working to convince the locals that it is in their best interest to become part of the Griffon Empire, hopefully leading to peaceful integration down the road. Uplift? Your diplomats would focus on building up the locals so that they become a viable trading partner down the road. Isoroku only mentions this one for completeness sake, but Conquest? Your diplomats will be aggressive and the harbingers of a future invasion in which you seize the planet by force.
[] | Assimilation |
[] | Uplift |
[] | Conquest |
There’s one other upgrade that is on the table, the new unit organizations for deployable units means that the
Tarawa-class dropships are no longer suitable for transporting an Armored or Mechanized Regiment. A modification stripping out the ASF launch bays allows for the expansion of the infantry compartment, albeit at the cost of a significant increase in, well, cost for procurement. The changes themselves are ridiculously simple to implement, however, and you only have 2 of the transports in service, thus it would be trivially easy to get them converted to this new conversion at the upgrade facility at no net cost to the Treasury.
And last, but certainly not least, a pair of new combat vehicles has been trialled and accepted into service, both fitting niche roles. The
Chaparral Arrow-IV Artillery Tank has been in testing for almost a decade now, but only recently have the last of the kinks been worked out of the ambitious weapons system. Paired Arrow-IV launchers and a deep magazine permit the
Chaparral to rain down destruction, however the systems ‘party piece’ is the 5 rounds of Surface-to-Air Arrow IV’s tied into a Nollak provided fire control system, giving the platform a nasty anti-ASF punch.
The other design is another Nollak special that has Willis muttering balefully. The
Shilka Air Defense Tank pairs two of the lightest LB-X autocannons with a pair of extended range 8cm lasers, all on a lighter and more mobile chassis than the existing
Skysweeper.