Quest Deep Periphery Quest (Battletech Sandbox Empire Builder)

KyranKandosa

Well-known member
[X]Permit the offer of life imprisonment rather than death to captured pirates who cooperate
Pirates may lie to save their skins, but we just have to warn them that we're prepared to make their executions an example and warning if they give us bad intel.
 

Artifex

Well-known member
[X]Permit the offer of life imprisonment rather than death to captured pirates who cooperate

Always the damn intelligentsia ... HUMINT is so important these times when we have nothing else to go on, so even hostis humanem generis may walk away from the noose ... albeit into a sealed lockbox instead.
 

Jarow

Well-known member
[X] Permit the offer of life imprisonment rather than death to captured pirates who cooperate

We do need intelligence.

[X] Plan: Light Enhancements
-[X] Procurement [$ 295,452,466,701.60 ]
--[X] Lay Down Major Unit [Construction - $3,404,060,117.50 ] (95)
---[X] 165 Bainbridge [95]
---[X] 90 Wright [95]
---[X] 50 Trenton [95]

---[X] 30 Saipan [95]
---[X] 40 Aetna [95]
---[X] 20 Meteor [95]
---[X] 19 Mikasa [95]

--[X] Lay down Jumpship [Jumpship Construction - $41,940,121.95 ] (90)
---[X] 9 Windjammer [90]

--[X] Lay down Warship [Warship Construction - $15,885,904,900.00 ] (90)
---[X] 20 Dido*
---[X] 10 Guiseppe Garibaldi*
---[X] 9 Hosho*

---[X] 20 Prinz Eugen*
---[X] 20 Prinz Eugen*

---[X] 4 Potemkin*
---[X] 2 Dreadnought*
---[X] 2 Jean Bart*
---[X] 2 Dreadnought*
---[X] 2 Jean Bart*

---[X] 30 Fubuki [90]
---[X] 30 England [90]
---[X] 40 Lyr [90]

---[X] 30 Dido [90]
---[X] 10 Guiseppe Garibaldi [90]
---[X] 4 Hosho [90]

---[X] 20 Prinz Eugen [90]

---[X] 2 Dreadnought [90]
---[X] 2 Jean Bart [90]

--[X] Purchase New Units [Minor Unit - $ 1,319,781,562.15 ] (90)
---[X] 90 Fleet Defense Wing [90]
---[X] 10 Heavy Carrier Wing [90]
---[X] 10 Strike Wing [90]

---[X] 5 Infantry Division [90]
---[X] 14 Garrison Division [90]
---[X] 14 Militia Division [90]

--[X] Fortress Command [$ 274,800,780,000.00 ] (90)
---[X] Construct Black Tower
----[X] Chuma [90]
----[X] Skala [90]
----[X] Pieklo [90]
----[X] Steingarten [90]
----[X] Pustina [90]
----[X] Kurortas [90]

-[X] General [$ 1,164,900,000,000.00 ]
--[X] Focus Development on Core World Nowy Wroclaw [85]
--[X] Focus Development on Peripheral World Glorriech [85]
--[X] Massive Core Investment Pieklo [80]
--[X] Massive Peripheral Investment Olej [80]
--[X] Economic Investment Okusawa [90]
--[X] Construct Infrastructure and Industrial zones on Bohren [90]
--[X] Construct Infrastructure and Industrial zones on Kurortas [90]
--[X] Construct Infrastructure and Industrial zones on Landprettig [90]
--[X] Construct Infrastructure and Industrial zones on Skala [90]
--[X] Construct Infrastructure and Industrial zones on Arvum [90]
(Hoping for more money next turn)

--[X] Expand Imperial Grifftiger Mounted Police [85]
--[X] Expand Special Branch [85]
(Want to prevent the issues of last turn)
--[X] Build Orbital Shipyard Porto Milano [105]
--[X] Build Orbital Shipyard Nuova Fortezza [105]
--[X] Build Orbital Shipyard Neuthuringen [105]
--[X] Build Orbital Shipyard Nowe Mazowsze [105]
(If we're going to build a bunch of baby warships, we need dropships to accompany them. Also, there's a max size for these, so they need new ones semi-regularly)
--[X] Construct Refit & Repair Yard [110]
(Need to keep our fleet in good condition)
--[X] Construct Escort Yard Landrettig [90]
--[X] Construct Escort Yard Bellaterra [90]
--[X] Construct Escort Yard Nubifragio [90]

--[X] Construct Escort Yard Kurortas [90]
--[X] Construct Escort Yard Olej [90]
--[X] Construct Escort Yard Pinball [90]
--[X] Construct Escort Yard Pustina [90]
--[X] Construct Escort Yard Raj [90]
--[X] Construct Escort Yard Steingarten [90]
--[X] Construct Escort Yard Glorreich [90]
--[X] Construct Escort Yard Grand View [90]
--[X] Construct Escort Yard Novolar [90]
--[X] Construct Escort Yard Pryyemnyy [90]

--[X] Construct Escort Yard Platzregensburg [90]
--[X] Construct Escort Yard Shin Tokyo [90]
--[X] Construct Escort Yard Porto Milano [90]
--[X] Construct Escort Yard Nuova Fortezza [90]
--[X] Construct Escort Yard Nowe Mazowsze [90]
--[X] Construct Escort Yard Neuthuringen [90]
(Baby warships)
--[X] Construct Military Logistics Factory (95)
---[X] 5 Shin Tokyo [95]
---[X] 5 Porto Milano [95]
---[X] 5 Nuova Fortezza [95]
---[X] 5 Nowe Mazowsze [95]
---[X] 5 Neuthuringen [95]
(Kee our military well supplied, and pretty sure these provide economic benefits more than the ones that build stuff do)
--[X] Upgrade Refit & Repair Yard [105]
--[X] Expand Orbital Shipyards [105]
--[X] Construct Large Warship Yard New Castor* [90]

--[X] Construct Large Warship Yard New Port Royal* [90]
--[X] Construct Large Warship Yard Nowy Wroclaw* [90]
--[X] Construct Large Warship Yard New Phoenix* [90]
--[X] Construct Small Warship Yard New Pollux [90]
--[X] Construct Small Warship Yard Edelsteine [90]
--[X] Construct Small Warship Yard Nya Kopenhamn [90]
--[X] Construct Small Warship Yard Okusawa [90]
--[X] Construct Small Warship Yard Calliope [90]
--[X] Construct Small Warship Yard Kainga [90]
--[X] Construct Small Warship Yard Nowa Warzsawa [90]
--[X] Construct Small Warship Yard New Capricorn [90]
--[X] Construct Small Warship Yard Griffon [90]
(More bigger yards isn't affordable, but we can do small yards)

-[X] DoME [$ 528,000,000,000.00 ]
--[X] Terraforming Bari [->4]
--[X] Terraforming Iskra [->4]
--[X] Terraforming Chuma [->4]
(Planets becoming better planets)
--[X] Expand Shin Tōkyō Arcologies [->1]
(Lots of potential here - relatively easy growth opportunities)
--[X] Construct Major Army Base - Arvum [->2]
--[X] Construct Major Fleet Base - Arvum [->4]
(Support for military operations closer to our current border)
--[X] Terraform Glorreich - Stage 0* [80]
--[X] Terraform Olej - Stage 0* [80]
--[X] Terraform Pryyemnyy - Stage 0* [85]
--[X] Terraforming Pustina* [->2]
--[X] Terraforming Bohren* [->1]
--[X] Terraforming Raj* [->1]

--[X] [Optimization] None [N/A]
(money issues mean nothing happening here, but the slot still exists)

-[X] Research [$ 352,700,000,000.00 ]
--[X] Genetic Engineering Lvl 4* [->1]
--[X] Advanced Terraforming Techniques* [->1]
--[X] Mental Genetic Enhancement [->4]
--[X] Physical Genetic Enhancement [->4]
(Really cheap, but some debate exists as to whether to do them at all or not)
--[X] Full Head Ejection System [->3]
--[X] Improved Escape Pods & Lifeboats [->2]
--[X] Improved Orbital Drop Cocoons [->4]
(Relatively inexpensive but useful techs)
--[X] Improved Germanium Refining Lvl 4* [->8]
--[X] Commercial R&D [-]
--[X] Industrial R&D [-]

-[X] Miscellaneous [$ 308,224,000,000 ]
--[X] Station Keeping [308,224,000,000]

140m leftover; not enough to upgrade a small shipyard to a large one or a peripheral planetary optimization.

There's been some conflict discussing mental/physical genetic enhancement, if anyone objects there's zero alternatives, but they can be dropped changing research price to 352,650,000,000 for one or 352,600,000,000 for both for a simple plan modification. Feel free to make those changes, or any others.
 

Yacovo

Occasionally spouting nonsense
[X] Plan: Light Enhancements

I have no qualms about researching enhancements, but we might want to preemptively look into revising the legal guidelines for things like Olympics. Maybe expand the scope to make a category for “enhanced” human events and invite the Killies and the Crimson Storm to participate.

Ultimately this is either going to be unfair to the Enhanced by setting them apart, or our allies by stomping their athletes with superior biotechnology, and I would pick our allies.
 
Turn 106 - For A Man Of The Streets

LordSunhawk

Das BOOT (literally)
Owner
Administrator
Staff Member
Founder
Turn 106 - For A Man Of The Streets

Meta Event25
Dynasty Luck25
Successes
Imperial Approval1
Approval Change0
Political Event-1
Successes
Imperial Economy0
Economic Event0
Research Event1
GriffonEcon7
Health2
Event5
Nowa WarszawaEcon0
Health6
Event4
Calliope IVEcon0
Health1
Event3
TTPEcon0
Health0
Event1
New CapricornEcon5
Health0
Event5
Nowy ŚląskEcon0
Health0
Event3
EdelsteineEcon2
Health2
Event3
Nowy WroclawEcon0
Health6
Event4
Griff's LeapEcon1
HealthN/A
Event2
New PhoenixEcon0
Health4
Event3
New EdenEcon6
Health4
Event4
New CastorEcon4
Health5
Event2
OkusawaEcon0
Health0
Event3
New PolluxEcon0
Health2
Event4
New Port RoyalEcon7
Health5
Event2
KaingaEcon3
Health4
Event3
ChumaEcon6
Health0
Event1
StahlfurtEcon6
HealthN/A
Event0
BāṛiEcon6
Health0
Event3
SkałaEcon2
Health0
Event1
PiekłoEcon2
Health7
Event5
Nya KöpenhamnEcon4
Health0
Event0
BauernparadisEcon0
Health1
Event3
AwhaEcon4
Health0
Event3
KaiyoEcon0
Health0
Event2
BohrenEcon0
Health0
Event4
Grand ViewEcon4
Health3
Event2
IskraEcon3
Health0
Event2
RajEcon0
Health0
Event2
FeursternEcon6
Health0
Event1
PinballEcon1
Health4
Event3
CatachanEcon2
Health2
Event0
NoxEcon0
Health6
Event1
OlejEcon0
Health0
Event1
GlorreichEcon0
Health0
Event3
PryyemnyyEcon4
Health0
Event2
NovolarEcon4
Health4
Event3
SteingartenEcon5
Health3
Event1
PustinaEcon5
Health3
Event2
KurortasEcon1
Health3
Event4
ArvumEcon0
Health0
Event2
LandprettigEcon1
Health4
Event1
BellaterraEcon4
Health2
Event1
NubifragioEcon0
Health0
Event3
PlatzregensburgEcon2
Health0
Event5
Shin TōkyōEcon1
Health4
Event1
Porto MilanoEcon2
Health3
Event0
Nuova FortezzaEcon0
Health0
Event4
Nowe MazowszeEcon0
Health1
Event3
NeuthüringenEcon0
Health0
Event1

Plan: Light Enhancements
- Procurement [$ 295,452,466,701.60 ]
-- Lay Down Major Unit [Construction - $3,404,060,117.50 ] (95)
--- 165 Bainbridge [95]
Target - 95
Roll - 93
Result - SUCCESS

--- 90 Wright [95]
Target - 95
Roll - 92
Result - SUCCESS

--- 50 Trenton [95]
Target - 95
Roll - 63
Result - SUCCESS

--- 30 Saipan [95]
Target - 95
Roll - 83
Result - SUCCESS

--- 40 Aetna [95]
Target - 95
Roll - 39
Result - SUCCESS

--- 20 Meteor [95]
Target - 95
Roll - 13
Result - SUCCESS

--- 19 Mikasa [95]
Target - 95
Roll - 9
Result - SUCCESS

-- Lay down Jumpship [Jumpship Construction - $41,940,121.95 ] (90)
--- 9 Windjammer [90]
Target - 90
Roll - 33
Result - SUCCESS

-- Lay down Warship [Warship Construction - $15,885,904,900.00 ] (90)
--- 30 Fubuki [90]
Target - 90
Roll - 88
Result - SUCCESS

--- 30 England [90]
Target - 90
Roll - 42
Result - SUCCESS

--- 40 Lyr [90]
Target - 90
Roll - 47
Result - SUCCESS

--- 30 Dido [90]
Target - 90
Roll - 23
Result - SUCCESS

--- 10 Guiseppe Garibaldi [90]
Target - 90
Roll - 49
Result - SUCCESS

--- 4 Hosho [90]
Target - 90
Roll - 75
Result - SUCCESS

--- 20 Prinz Eugen [90]
Target - 90
Roll - 55
Result - SUCCESS

--- 2 Dreadnought [90]
Target - 90
Roll - 71
Result - SUCCESS

--- 2 Jean Bart [90]
Target - 90
Roll - 30
Result - SUCCESS

-- Purchase New Units [Minor Unit - $ 1,319,781,562.15 ] (90)
--- 90 Fleet Defense Wing [90]
Target - 90
Roll - 35
Result - SUCCESS

--- 10 Heavy Carrier Wing [90]
Target - 90
Roll - 57
Result - SUCCESS

--- 10 Strike Wing [90]
Target - 90
Roll - 49
Result - SUCCESS

--- 5 Infantry Division [90]
Target - 90
Roll - 76
Result - SUCCESS

--- 14 Garrison Division [90]
Target - 90
Roll - 30
Result - SUCCESS

--- 14 Militia Division [90]
Target - 90
Roll - 77
Result - SUCCESS

-- Fortress Command [$ 274,800,780,000.00 ] (90)
--- Construct Black Tower
---- Chuma [90]
Target - 90
Roll - 5
Result - SUCCESS

---- Skala [90]
Target - 90
Roll - 57
Result - SUCCESS

---- Pieklo [90]
Target - 90
Roll - 34
Result - SUCCESS

---- Steingarten [90]
Target - 90
Roll - 64
Result - SUCCESS

---- Pustina [90]
Target - 90
Roll - 29
Result - SUCCESS

---- Kurortas [90]
Target - 90
Roll - 67
Result - SUCCESS

- General [$ 1,164,900,000,000.00 ]
-- Focus Development on Core World Nowy Wroclaw [85]
Target - 85
Roll – 99, Jarow reroll – 96, ShadowArxxy reroll – 98, Hellspawn reroll – 98, General reroll – 98, General reroll - 58
Result - SUCCESS

-- Focus Development on Peripheral World Glorriech [85]
Target - 85
Roll – 98, General reroll - 15
Result - SUCCESS

-- Massive Core Investment Pieklo [80]
Target - 80
Roll - 33
Result - SUCCESS

-- Massive Peripheral Investment Olej [80]
Target - 80
Roll - 59
Result - SUCCESS

-- Economic Investment Okusawa [90]
Target - 90
Roll - 80
Result - SUCCESS

-- Construct Infrastructure and Industrial zones on Bohren [90]
Target - 90
Roll - 87
Result - SUCCESS

-- Construct Infrastructure and Industrial zones on Kurortas [90]
Target - 90
Roll - 36
Result - SUCCESS

-- Construct Infrastructure and Industrial zones on Landprettig [90]
Target - 90
Roll - 40
Result - SUCCESS

-- Construct Infrastructure and Industrial zones on Skala [90]
Target - 90
Roll - 80
Result - SUCCESS

-- Construct Infrastructure and Industrial zones on Arvum [90]
Target - 90
Roll - 58
Result - SUCCESS

-- Expand Imperial Grifftiger Mounted Police [85]
Target - 85
Roll - 3
Result - SUCCESS

-- Expand Special Branch [85]
Target - 85
Roll - 36
Result - SUCCESS

-- Build Orbital Shipyard Porto Milano [105]
Target - 105
Roll - 40
Result - SUCCESS

-- Build Orbital Shipyard Nuova Fortezza [105]
Target - 105
Roll - 83
Result - SUCCESS

-- Build Orbital Shipyard Neuthuringen [105]
Target - 105
Roll - 98
Result - SUCCESS

-- Build Orbital Shipyard Nowe Mazowsze [105]
Target - 105
Roll - 74
Result - SUCCESS

-- Construct Refit & Repair Yard [110]
Target - 110
Roll - 99
Result - SUCCESS

-- Construct Escort Yard Landrettig [90]
Target - 90
Roll - 56
Result - SUCCESS

-- Construct Escort Yard Bellaterra [90]
Target - 90
Roll - 56
Result - SUCCESS

-- Construct Escort Yard Nubifragio [90]
Target - 90
Roll - 17
Result - SUCCESS

-- Construct Escort Yard Kurortas [90]
Target - 90
Roll - 31
Result - SUCCESS

-- Construct Escort Yard Olej [90]
Target - 90
Roll - 82
Result - SUCCESS

-- Construct Escort Yard Pinball [90]
Target - 90
Roll - 89
Result - SUCCESS

-- Construct Escort Yard Pustina [90]
Target - 90
Roll - 86
Result - SUCCESS

-- Construct Escort Yard Raj [90]
Target - 90
Roll - 50
Result - SUCCESS

-- Construct Escort Yard Steingarten [90]
Target - 90
Roll - 76
Result - SUCCESS

-- Construct Escort Yard Glorreich [90]
Target - 90
Roll - 24
Result - SUCCESS

-- Construct Escort Yard Grand View [90]
Target - 90
Roll - 31
Result - SUCCESS

-- Construct Escort Yard Novolar [90]
Target - 90
Roll - 26
Result - SUCCESS

-- Construct Escort Yard Pryyemnyy [90]
Target - 90
Roll - 85
Result - SUCCESS

-- Construct Escort Yard Platzregensburg [90]
Target - 90
Roll - 32
Result - SUCCESS

-- Construct Escort Yard Shin Tokyo [90]
Target - 90
Roll - 85
Result - SUCCESS

-- Construct Escort Yard Porto Milano [90]
Target - 90
Roll - 53
Result - SUCCESS

-- Construct Escort Yard Nuova Fortezza [90]
Target - 90
Roll - 70
Result - SUCCESS

-- Construct Escort Yard Nowe Mazowsze [90]
Target - 90
Roll - 60
Result - SUCCESS

-- Construct Escort Yard Neuthuringen [90]
Target - 90
Roll - 84
Result - SUCCESS

-- Construct Military Logistics Factory (95)
--- 5 Shin Tokyo [95]
Target - 95
Roll - 91
Result - SUCCESS

--- 5 Porto Milano [95]
Target - 95
Roll - 92
Result - SUCCESS

--- 5 Nuova Fortezza [95]
Target - 95
Roll - 87
Result - SUCCESS

--- 5 Nowe Mazowsze [95]
Target - 95
Roll - 80
Result - SUCCESS

--- 5 Neuthuringen [95]
Target - 95
Roll - 69
Result - SUCCESS

-- Upgrade Refit & Repair Yard [105]
Target - 105
Roll - 99
Result - SUCCESS

-- Expand Orbital Shipyards [105]
Target - 105
Roll - 96
Result - SUCCESS

-- Construct Large Warship Yard New Castor* [90]
Target - 90
Roll - 69
Result - SUCCESS

-- Construct Large Warship Yard New Port Royal* [90]
Target - 90
Roll - 57
Result - SUCCESS

-- Construct Large Warship Yard Nowy Wroclaw* [90]
Target - 90
Roll - 55
Result - SUCCESS

-- Construct Large Warship Yard New Phoenix* [90]
Target - 90
Roll - 47
Result - SUCCESS

-- Construct Small Warship Yard New Pollux [90]
Target - 90
Roll - 45
Result - SUCCESS

-- Construct Small Warship Yard Edelsteine [90]
Target - 90
Roll - 26
Result - SUCCESS

-- Construct Small Warship Yard Nya Kopenhamn [90]
Target - 90
Roll - 24
Result - SUCCESS

-- Construct Small Warship Yard Okusawa [90]
Target - 90
Roll - 56
Result - SUCCESS

-- Construct Small Warship Yard Calliope [90]
Target - 90
Roll - 61
Result - SUCCESS

-- Construct Small Warship Yard Kainga [90]
Target - 90
Roll - 41
Result - SUCCESS

-- Construct Small Warship Yard Nowa Warzsawa [90]
Target - 90
Roll - 67
Result - SUCCESS

-- Construct Small Warship Yard New Capricorn [90]
Target - 90
Roll - 8
Result - SUCCESS

-- Construct Small Warship Yard Griffon [90]
Target - 90
Roll - 16
Result - SUCCESS

- DoME [$ 528,000,000,000.00 ]
-- Terraform Glorreich - Stage 0* [80]
Target - 80
Roll - 68
Result - SUCCESS

-- Terraform Olej - Stage 0* [80]
Target - 80
Roll - 52
Result - SUCCESS

-- Terraform Pryyemnyy - Stage 0* [85]
Target - 85
Roll - 12
Result - SUCCESS

-- [Optimization] None [N/A]
(money issues mean nothing happening here, but the slot still exists)

- Research [$ 352,700,000,000.00 ]
-- Commercial R&D [-]
-- Industrial R&D [-]

- Miscellaneous [$ 308,224,000,000 ]
-- Station Keeping [308,224,000,000]

-----

You finally are able to spend some time catching up on the Pan Griffon Games. Overall they went very well, with a surprising number of medals won by the periphery worlds this year, which is always welcome.

You do have some entertainment reading a series of research studies that document the performance of genetically enhanced vrs non-genetically enhanced individuals performance in various events, which comes to the conclusion that overall the current genetic enhancements seen in athletes and such come in within the margin of error at the very end of the bell curve, but the peak of the bell curve is shifted noticeably to the right side of the performance graph.

Ultimately, the main effect of the genetic enhancements isn’t so much to create supermen, but rather to create Captain America’s, using an ancient comic book reference that your great aunt points you to. Simple anatomy and physics put hard limits on human performance, and while the modifications make it somewhat more common to reach those limits, it doesn’t change the limits themselves by any measurable margin.

Now that the Duc de Nouvelle Picardie is no longer raising stinks about everything, considering that he is confined to his capital city and currently ranting vociferously about how he is going to stake you and your daughters out naked in the public square for dogs to copulate with once he inevitably defeats you, an assertion your troops find rather laughable as the continue to tighten the noose around him.

The RRF is certainly giving him ample reason to go insane, as they’ve somehow managed to scrounge up enough massive speakers to outfit several thousand arenas, hooked them up to the reactors of some of your Trenton-class dropships that are acting as strongpoints in the siege lines, and are currently blasting Thunderstruck at ear splitting volume in time to the artillery barrages. When they aren’t playing Another One Bites The Dust, or to mix things up Dust In The Wind. And one mustn’t forget the endless replays of Never Gonna Give You Up.

They very thoughtfully provided friendly forces with top end earplugs. They also sent multiple care packages loaded with ‘Ducal Approved Earplugs’ which are tastefully decorated with itty bitty sheep soaring into the various cities under siege. This is good, because you think they’d get lynched by their own side once they started playing The Song That Doesn’t End...

Riots are intensifying within the remaining Ducal holdings, and your commanders believe that by early next year the sieges should be complete. Assuming that the RRF doesn’t drive the Duc to an aneurysm first, of course.

There have been no Black Steel attacks in the last several months since the Battle of Arvum. By all indications the analysts may well be right in their assessment of what the Black Steel is up to, but your forces are remaining on the alert.

In more local news, DoME has successfully completed work on Olej, Pryyemnyy, and Glorreich, significantly improving local environmental conditions, and in the case of Pryyemnyy and Glorreich making them completely independent of external support in terms of food, air, and water, which is giving them a rather nice growth bonus.

A large number of new shipyards, both for dropships and warships, have been completed, boosting your production capacity quite strongly. In addition your refit & repair capacity has been expanded, including a new facility in the Arvum system which is already seeing use in repairing damaged vessels from the recent battle.

Your logistics support base has grown considerably, directly reducing upkeep costs and benefiting the economies of the various systems which host said factories. Similarly, industrial & infrastructure expansion has been quite successful, especially in the Bohren system where surveying teams discovered several veins of valuable industrial metals, boosting the formerly ‘Poor’ system to a rating of ‘Average’ by the Interior Ministry for economic growth potential. Industry is flocking to the system to take advantage of the new finds.

Overall economic growth is solid, although you are trying hard not to wince at the massive report from Nowy Wroclaw detailing the gazillion and one ways that the project nearly failed as it appeared that the imp of the perverse, or a particularly drunk dwarf or something similar, was really entertaining itself at the project teams expense.

Seriously, optical data disks are waterproof, vacuum proof, fireproof, radiation proof, ice proof, impact resistant, with casings made from the same sort of material used in the frames of combat vehicles. Evidently they are not toddler proof, because a Take Your Child To Work day event almost ended in disaster for the focus project due to this. This doesn’t even go into network glitches requiring critical documents to be transferred via a courier and sneakernet, only for said courier to get pulled over by the Griffsport PD due to an overly officious officer wanting to hit them for dirty license plates, which escalated into a near officer involved shooting when said officer mistook the security case for a potential threat and reacted… poorly. Luckily his partner managed to defuse the situation, only for the courier's vehicle to refuse to start back up again due to an undetected maintenance fault in the starter button.

The courier, dedicated to duty, wound up walking.

Fifteen miles.

Fifteen seconds after the courier arrived the network decided that it was actually a network, after considering the possibility that it may be a baseball, or a scuba tank, or possibly even a stepladder. Which made that entire bit of misadventure utterly moot.

The courier still got a commendation for it all. Poor interns.

These were the more sane occurrences on that project. Your head and your desk develop an intimate and loving relationship when you read the portions related to the HPG transmissions between Griffon and Nowy Wroclaw somehow getting garbled resulting in three complete transmission windows being missed, causing the authorization orders to arrive only ten minutes before the hard deadline to start work locally.

Said work was nearly derailed when, in an environmentally controlled building far away from the nearest fields a queen bee evidently managed to get inside and establish a hive in the bathroom. Causing the building to be closed for a day in the middle of the project while building management safely relocated the hive to a more suitable location. Then inside a toilet in the ladies’ room.

But, in the end, success was had, and the project was completed before the final deadline and, miraculously, within budget.

A very large number of new naval vessels have been laid down this year as well as commissioned. You actually take the time to personally attend the mass commissioning of the four shiny new Potemkin-class Troop Cruisers, the completion of which has allowed HMS Morristown to finally revert to proper museum status.
 
Turn 107 - This Bloody Road Remains A Mystery

LordSunhawk

Das BOOT (literally)
Owner
Administrator
Staff Member
Founder
Turn 107 - This Bloody Road Remains A Mystery

The siege lines on Nouvelle Picardie have erupted into open combat as the Ducal forces make a last ditch effort to break out of their containment. Intense fighting rages for sixteen hours across multiple fronts. In the end the Ducal forces are forced to retreat back to their lines, brutalized and bloodied.

General Fitzpatrick smells a rat, though, and declines to pursue, instead he has his forces pull back slightly to be fully within the anti-missile defensive envelope of the grounded Trenton-class transports. His caution is rewarded, as they’d only barely made it there when the Duc launches a nuclear strike on their former positions, while loudly proclaiming that your forces had launched the strike.

The devastation is enormous, but the Duc had been expecting that your troops would aggressively pursue, and would thus have been caught in the blast and thus unfortunately unavailable to dispute his characterization of events. So when Ducal forces swarm into the irradiated wasteland left behind by the strike, they find nothing. Once General Fitzpatrick is able to confirm from orbital reconnaissance that the majority of the remaining Ducal forces are in the blast scar, he orders all of his artillery to begin a carpet barrage of the entire scar.

Then, and only then, does he order a general assault, with medical units hot on the troops heels to provide whatever aid that they can to the population. By the time your forces arrived at the Ducal bunker, however, the Duc had committed suicide, with a final propaganda broadcast from his people declaring that your forces had ‘treacherously murdered’ him and continuing the Big Lie about you being responsible for the nuclear strike.

You’ve already been in contact with the Bourbon King, who assures you that nobody of any consequence believes the lies of the Duc de Nouvelle Picardie. They thank you profusely for your assistance, and as agreed upon provide full compensation for your injured and dead soldiers, as well as a substantial payment directly from the Royal Treasury.

((As a consequence of this event chain, +1% Tax rate this year, far more cordial relations with the Nouveau Royaume des Bourbons))

The ink is barely dry, figuratively as such things are done electronically in this day and age, on the final agreements between the Bourbons and yourself that General Bradley informs you that the Army is initiating a full After-Action Review. They intend to have recommendations for the crown by next year on how to proceed with reforming the Imperial Griffon Army.

You are quite amused that it took the Headmistress at St Trinians the entire first semester to figure out that her new student was your daughter, helped by the fact that her contacts within Special Branch cheerfully furthered the masquerade and deliberately failed to inform her of the situation.

She promptly sends you a letter, in high umbridge, declaring that just because young Lisa Marie is your daughter does not exempt her from the required curriculum at the school, nor does it exempt her from playing field hockey. You promptly respond that if the field hockey team does anything so gauche as getting caught cheating that you will personally take appropriate steps, possibly involving paperwork. You are promptly declared to be a fiend of the highest order, and assured that St Trinians has never once been caught cheating at the sacred and noble sport of field hockey. Except that one time, and that other time, but we don’t speak of those sad blemishes on our spotless record.

You promptly send over a ‘Got Caught By The Empress’ form for the Headmistress to fill out as a warning shot that you were serious about weaponizing paperwork against her if she failed to maintain the high standards that you expect from the school.

It’s good to be an Empress.

The Black Steel is still being very quiet, which is helpful on the one hand as it allows you to build up more forces, but worrying on the other because it is giving them time to build up as well, and they have significant building capacity.

Both the NRR and NRI have expanded in the past year, establishing a total of four new colonies between them, a pair each. The NRR continues to slowly expand to the southwest, establishing colonies at GX-Q23 and GX-R23, named Nye Rogaland and Nye Viken respectively. Both are relatively marginal worlds, in your opinion, the sort of places you’d settle in order to give DoME a good reason to exist. The NRI is expanding to the east, settling GX-N37 and GX-N38, which they’ve dubbed Novum Cosanum and Nova Ariminum respectively. Both are relatively pleasant worlds, which had previously been settled by pirates. The NRI was able to handle the poorly equipped and even more poorly led pirates on their own, freeing a large number of slaves in the process.

Interrogation of captured pirates is ongoing, with General Messerschmidt rather grimly informing you that the links to the Rouges Noir are all but confirmed. Several Rouges Noir operatives were embedded with the pirates, although those worthies committed suicide rather than be captured. Weapons of the sort that the Rouges Noir use have been found in armories, and several of the pirates who took the deal offered by your intelligence agencies have been able to confirm that the leadership had at least authorized the transfer of several Jolly Rogers with modern drives to the pirates, but they’ve not been able to confirm whether or not the transfer ever took place as the authorization was only a few days before your attack.

This is a threat that needs to be honored, the Rouges Noir are utter fanatics who would gladly make use of WMDs on planets if they felt they couldn’t capture them, and have zero qualms about terrorism and assassination as tools of war. With the Black Steel lurking to the galactic Northwest, it puts you in the jaws of a very unpalatable vice. Both are serious threats, yet you can’t fully deal with them both at the same time.

The best option, as far as your naval planners can determine, is to make full use of your alliance with the NRI to secure that flank. All England-class Frigates, with a leavening of your more obsolescent ships that are still in service, backed up by flotillas of Pilum-class corvettes from the NRI will secure those systems most at threat, Meanwhile the Grand Fleet, now with the Expeditionary Fleet returned to the fold, will continue to serve as your primary anti-Black Steel force.

You also have a decision to make. You can focus your expansion efforts to the galactic Northwest in hopes of tracking down the Black Steel base and destroying it as quickly as possible, while increasing your strategic depth in that direction, or you can focus on fully surrounding Rouges Noir space in order to cut them off from any potential expansion prior to bringing the hammer down upon them.

[]ActionArgument
[]Expand towards the Black SteelThe Black Steel is by far the more dangerous opponent, especially the longer we give them to build up. Every attack so far has been more powerful than the last, and the nature of the Black Steel means that losses in these attacks are actually trivial for them. We need to continue to pressure them and hopefully destroy their base.
[]Expand towards the Rouges NoirWe have two enemies, one currently strong, one currently weak. Both are threats, especially to our civilian populations if your military fails to contain them. We can more easily take out the Rouges Noir than the Black Steel, we know where they are located, and we know that we have the technological and military advantage. Removing them from the field massively improves our ability to project force against the Black Steel.
 

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