Quest Deep Periphery Quest (Battletech Sandbox Empire Builder)

Turn 105 - The Sign Of The Burning Sun

You ask Amaunet to join you in your cat-friendly office, what with having Bastet, Sekhmet and the others around the place when the Palace was first built shows in the careful attention to ‘making it big enough for the Eldest’... which makes it big enough for Amaunet since she only comes up to the Eldest’s shoulder.

She has the now ubiquitous, among cats at least, translation computer hooked up to a lightly ornamented collar around her neck, while a harness of plates made from ferro-aluminum rest lightly on her massive flanks and chest. The massive cat settles in front of your desk with an amused expression you’ve come to associate with the oldest of the giant cats.

‘Talking’ with a Grifftiger is a bit surreal, their natural ‘voice’ is a deep, almost subsonic rumble that resonates in your very bones, but then the translation computer takes those intricate, if inaudible, sounds and converts them into speech, with each Grifftiger choosing a ‘voice’ for the output. You’d always found Amaunet’s choice of ‘voice’ to be wildly hilarious, since she worked with the programmers to tweak it to fit her chosen accent.

Which is why you have a Grifftiger who sounds like a feminine version of an ancient earth actor by the name of Marlon Brando in his role as the Godfather. Only with a much stronger Italian accent, which makes it all the more amusing, especially since you’d heard Amaunet giving a highly detailed and technical briefing to the Imperial Guard that left everybody in the room suppressing helpless giggles while retaining the information she’d passed on. The old cat is good.

“Well, Padrone, I will be authorizing Bradley to fire some more people in Procurement. How she’s put up with them so long is beyond me.” she says as the conversation shifts to current plans. “Once the operation is done with that irritating idiota I’ll also be authorizing her to expand the RRF. Those ragazzi e ragazze are proving themselves, I’ve always regretted that I was too old and big to play with those little sleds but that is the life of a grande gatto, si?”

Black Steel activity remains low, a few skirmishes here and there along the northwestern frontier against corvettes and frigates, but nothing decisive at all. The frequency of the attacks is greatest in the Arvum system, although Bohren is also being hit regularly. Analysts are divided as to whether this means you are getting close to the Black Steel regional base or not.

Reports from Nouvelle Picardie indicate that the RRF is continuing to raise your side’s morale and the Duc’s blood pressure. Their latest bit of shenanigans is airdropping squeaky toy sheep with ‘Dispositif de divertissement sexuel officiel Ducal’ across the front lines, said squeaky toy sheep are equipped with tiny pressure valves cunningly designed to emit a plaintive ‘baaaaaa’ whenever said toy is squeezed in true squeaky toy fashion.

According to General Fitzpatrick, as well as the war correspondents reporting from the front lines, your troops have taken to ‘baa-ing’ at the enemy with great enthusiasm. You can generally tell when you are facing conscripts who’d rather be somewhere else, as you get either no response or the militia forces join in. The true loyalists to the Duc generally get furious and unleash torrents of fire upon wherever the insidious sheep noises are coming from.

Landings have been made on all other continents on the planet, with the offensive shifting to a more broadly based pressure situation now that a secure beachhead has been made. General Fitzpatrick has requested two additional Regimental Combat Team Divisions for the offensive, a request you see no reason not to grant.

Fleet elements attached to Operation Back Yard have initiated combat operations against the pirates in GX-I35 and GX-J36. As expected the relatively light formations built around Dido-class light cruisers utterly outmatch the pirates Jolly Rogers, attaining space supremacy almost immediately.

In both systems the main ‘habitable’ planets require environmental domes, as the atmospheres are both noxious and mildly poisonous to humans. GX-I35, the red dwarf system, has extremely extensive asteroid belts that just the combat scanners of the flotilla are able to determine are extremely rich in industrial metals, judging by the enormous magres interference from them. GX-J36, on the other hand, has a pair of habitable moons orbiting a super-Jupiter gas giant, which are both quite rich in resources in their own right.

Landing forces are able to route the pirates readily, indeed once you take out their headquarters domes and capture or destroy their leadership the rest of the ‘pirates’ fall over themselves in their eagerness to get the slave collars off their necks.

You do get reports that the operational CO is convening a number of General Courts Martial, however, as some troops got just a bit… enthusiastic… with dealing with the pirate leadership, including several cases of blatant extra-judicial murder of helpless prisoners. While everybody agrees that those people were utter scum, who were destined for a good spacing anyways, the law is the law, and even men who’d just seen child-sized shock collars which had quite obviously been used were not excused from the consequences of their actions.

The report rather dryly notes that such factors would be considered in the trials, and would likely result in far lighter sentences than otherwise, the principle remains. You quite approve of this, justice must be for everybody, even the worst of the worst, else it becomes vengeance instead. The Griffon Empire has built itself on the notion of equal justice before the law.

That aside, the rescued slaves inform your forces that GX-I35 is known as Porto Milano, while GX-J36 has been called Nuova Fortezza. Your survey units are already hard at work and, according to the reports, they hope to be able to actually commence colonization work in both systems this year if all goes to plan.

Turn 105 - Into the Face of the Evil One

You receive a very disturbing bit of news early one morning. The dropship carrying your Foreign Minister back from a meeting in the NRR suffered a massive reactor explosion while under thrust, killing all aboard. The dropship in question was a heavily modified PPG-50 based design converted into a VIP transport for the Foreign Ministry.

Telemetry indicates that the reactor lost containment, the safety systems that were intended to prevent such somehow not functioning properly. The rest of the VIP fleet has been grounded for inspection.

Several days later you receive the news, on several of the VIP transports based on the PPG-50 there were multiple bad batches of massively substandard subsystems, all sourced to the same maintenance contractor. The paperwork indicated that they’d all passed inspection, however physical inspection shows that none of them should have passed even the most cursory of automated inspection processes, let alone the in depth inspections required for the VIP fleet.

The IGMP is massively overstretched, oversight of this sort of thing would normally be in their wheelhouse but they’ve been so underfunded now for years that things have fallen through the cracks. Justice Minister Kalinowski had requested increased funding for the IGMP for several years, but the low crime rates had caused you to not approve the budget increases.

You are now faced with a public relations crisis, the need to replace your Foreign Minister, and whether or not to accept Martina’s offer to resign in order to take all the heat on her own head and spare the crown the bad publicity.

Leila’s death opens a major hole in your cabinet, while her contributions have been quiet and rarely required much intervention on your part, she’d managed to positively impact how the Empire was viewed by your neighbors, allaying fears of imperialism, and generally doing her job quietly yet skillfully. You’ll miss her competence, and it is vital that you replace her as quickly as possible.

Thankfully Tiberius is able to assemble dossiers on potential replacements quite quickly, assisted by General Messerschmidt for background checks.


It is now budget time, marred a bit by the absence of Leila.

Amaunet doesn’t bother moving to the podium, instead rumbling an almost infrasonic clearing of the throat to attract everybody's attention before she gets started. “Padrone, we’ll be expanding quite a bit in resource production across the board, take it as given that if we can expand it, we’ll be wanting you to authorize expanding it, if we can build it, we’re going to be asking you to build it.”

She pauses, her tail twitching a bit. “General Bradley will be first, General?”

General Bradley then takes the podium, nodding to her new superior. “Your Majesty, we continue to be somewhat behind the eight-ball when it comes to strategic materials, and while the situation is improving that is a long way from saying it is resolved, or even in a good place. We’re up to being able to procure 5 Infantry Divisions a year, but that is only barely keeping up with our expansion, and with the recent improvements to Endo Steel we anticipate pressure on Ferro Fibrous armor supplies to only increase as more of our mech units will be using the improved armor.” She brings up the graph you’ve gotten depressingly familiar with the last few years.


“Therefore, we will be making the following budget requests this year, Your Majesty.”

• Imperial Griffon Army
  • Production
    • Strategic Materials
      • New Orbital Factories (5 each)
        • Double Heatsinks
        • Endo-Steel
        • Ferro-Fibrous Armor
      • Upgrade Orbital Factories
        • Double Heatsinks
        • Endo-Steel
        • Ferro-Fibrous Armor
    • Logistics (5 each)
      • Calliope
      • Awha
      • Catachan
      • Chuma
      • Griffon
      • Iskra
      • Kainga
      • New Castor
      • Nowa Warszawa
      • Olej
      • Steingarten
  • Procurement
    • Conventional
      • 5 Infantry Divisions
    • Garrison
      • 12 Garrison Divisions
      • 12 Militia Divisions

Amaunet rumbles as General Bradley sits back down. “Padrone, the logistics factories are proving their worth in reducing overall maintenance requirements for our equipment across the board, it may seem excessive but it’s saving us money every year. General Romanov?”

General Romanov nods to the big cat, then takes her place behind the podium. “Your Majesty, the Aerospace Force will continue to expand production capacity to meet requirements. With the success of the new carriers and the deployable ASF platforms we will want as many birds to fill those bays as possible.”

• Imperial Griffon Aerospace Force
  • Production
    • ASF Factories
      • Awha
      • Bari
      • Bellaterra
      • Glorreich
      • Landprettig
      • Novolar
      • Platzregensburg
      • Pryyemnyy
      • Pustina
      • Shin Tōkyō
    • Strategic Materials
      • New Orbital Factories (5 each)
        • Ferro-Aluminum Armor
      • Upgrade Orbital Factories
        • Ferro-Aluminum Armor
  • Procurement
    • 90 Fleet Defense Wings
    • 10 Heavy Carrier Wings

Amaunet interjects again as General Romanov sits down. “We’re building the new factories out around the rim of the Empire in order to stimulate those economies as well as guard against putting too many of our eggs in too few baskets. Admiral Fisher?”

Admiral Fisher stumps his way up to the podium with his usual complete disregard for grace or decorum. “The navy needs more ships, we need more shipyards, and we need them yesterday if not sooner. I say this every year, but it can never be said enough. The Black Steel is being quiet, which is not good as it means they are building up their forces, and I don’t have capital ships to face them yet.” He scowls at the room. “Unfortunately I can’t simply wave a magic wand and get more ships, so we need to build them.”

• Imperial Griffon Navy
  • Production
    • Upgrade all Orbital Shipyards
    • Upgrade all Repair & Refit Yards
    • Escort Yards
      • Kurortas
      • Olej
      • Pinball
      • Pustina
      • Raj
      • Steingarten
      • Glorreich
      • Grand View
      • Novolar
      • Pryyemnyy
      • Landprettig
      • Bellaterra
      • Nubifragio
      • Platzregensburg
      • Shin Tōkyō
    • Small Warship Yards
      • Nya Kopenhamn
      • Kainga
      • Okusawa
      • Griffon
      • New Pollux
      • Edelsteine
      • New Capricorn
      • Calliope
      • Nowy Warszawa
    • Large Warship Yards
      • New Phoenix
      • New Castor
      • New Port Royal
      • Nowy Wrocław
  • Procurement
    • Standard Dropships
      • 100 Bainbridge-class Parasite Destroyers
      • 50 Long Beach-class Parasite Destroyers
      • 90 Wright-class Dockable ASF Platforms
      • 1 Queen-class Infantry Transport
      • 40 Trenton-class Transports
    • Large Dropships
      • 20 Meteor-class Parasite Missile Battleships
      • 40 Aetna-class Parasite Missile Battleships
      • 30 Saipan-class Parasite Carriers
      • 54 Mikasa-class Parasite Battleships
    • Jumpships
      • 8 Windjammer-class
    • Escorts
      • 40 Fubuki-class Destroyers
      • 30 England-class Frigates
      • 40 Lyr-class Corvettes
    • Small Warships
      • 20 Dido-class Light Cruisers
      • 10 Guiseppe Garibaldi-class Light Cruisers
      • 9 Hosho-class Light Carriers
    • Medium Warships
      • 20 Prinz Eugen-class Heavy Cruisers
    • Large Warships
      • 2 Dreadnought-class Battleships
      • 2 Jean Bart-class Battlecruisers
  • Fortress Command
    • Jump Point Defenses
      • Porto Milano
      • Nuova Fortezza
      • Nowe Mazowsze
      • Neuthüringen
    • Oasis II
      • Porto Milano
      • Nuova Fortezza
      • Nowe Mazowsze
      • Neuthüringen
    • Black Tower
      • Porto Milano
      • Nuova Fortezza
      • Nowe Mazowsze
      • Neuthüringen
      • Raj

Amaunet smiles slightly, baring a bit of a fang. “The military is getting stronger, Padrone, the question will be if it’ll be enough.”

Elizabeth Lee walks around Amaunet to the podium, pausing for a moment to give the big cat a quick scritch behind the ears, which the Grifftiger accepts as her proper due. “Needless to say, Interior is ready to support all of that building, and then some. We don’t have any free DoME teams at the moment, but our economic, colonial, and investment groups are ready and waiting for authorization to get to work.” She brings up the first of the charts.

“To start with, we have four prospective new colonies, two of which have ex-slaves on them who are understandably quite eager to be under our protection.”

• Colonial Development, Establishment of Government & Justice Systems
  • Porto Milano
  • Nuova Fortezza
  • Nowe Mazowsze
  • Neuthüringen

“Next up are the economic recommendations.”

• Economic Focus, Investment & Development
  • Focus
    • Core
      • Edelsteine
    • Periphery
      • Stahlfurt
  • Major Investment
    • Core
      • Nowy Wrocław
    • Periphery
      • Arvum
  • Investment
    • New Pollux
  • Infrastructure & Industrial Zones
    • Bohren
    • Kurortas
    • Landprettig
    • Skala
    • Raj

Tiberius is handling both Political and Foreign Ministry duties for this cycle. “Your Majesty, on the politics side, we’re ready to support the colonial expansion that Elizabeth laid out. If we have sufficient budget left over we’d recommend a PR campaign to counter the effects of the recent scandal, but that may not be needed. On the diplomatic front, we might want to consider hosting a cultural festival in Leila’s honor, it’s what she enjoyed the most after all.”

Grace takes over from there. “We have four teams ready to go, Your Majesty. We’re not recommending any military research this year, mostly because we have a number of basic R&D projects that will lead to overall general improvements in the near future.”

• R&D
  • Materials Research Lvl 8
  • Orbital Infrastructure Lvl 8
  • Power Generation Lvl 8
  • Improved Germanium Refining Lvl 4

General Messerschmidt and Martina are both off overseeing the investigation into the latest corruption scandal, both have left memos indicating that apart from expanding Special Branch there’s nothing that they recommend.