Arthur - Sadistic Melee
Kirato - Panicky Heavy Ranged
Hiro - Cowardly Rifleman
Bunker Bustin'
Arthur activated his Booster Jets to leap towards the first enemy AESIR, but fell over in the mountainous terrain, while Hiro shot another missile out of the air with his laser rifle. Kirato kept Hacking the second mech, bringing it to 20 Control Points, then Shut it Down; Schweitzer thanked them for bringing one in intact for research. Just before Arthur made it back to his feet, the remaining Brick fired its missile at the ground nearby, and he failed to Drop and Dodge the area of effect, getting knocked down and stunned ("Would you please react to being hit by a missile?" "Uhh, ouch, that hurt").
While Arthur slowly got back up again and Hiro stumbled towards the enemy AESIR, Kirato moved into range and just barely Hacked it for 2CP. The last drone started flying at Kirato, and Arthur landed an All-Out Attack (Double) on the Brick, destroying its Auto-Loader with the first and its Radar Suite with the second, stunning it. He called back to HQ, asking if he could destroy this one, and Schweitzer didn't seem too upset, so Arthur stabbed the Brick's Reactor, utterly destroying it. The drone retreated out of range, and the battle was over.
Debriefing
The intact Brick AESIR was brought back to the hangar, where Schweitzer and the rest of Engineering descended upon it for research and analysis. After several hours, the party were called into Holger's office for debriefing, the many monitors plastered with images of the Brick and its subsystems. Now that they had a good look at it, the Brick was unmistakably related to their own AESIR, if a bit chunkier.
Halvorsen congratulated them on bringing it back intact, as Valhalla Base had limited resources, and fresh parts could be repurposed for new systems for the pilots. If possible, he asked that they try to bring back everything they could from future field missions. Moving on, Holger went over some basics of AESIR operation: while humans couldn't pilot the AESIR due to the neural load, fortunately, neither could an AI, though they weren't sure why.
On that subject, Engineering had figured out how LOKI was piloting its AESIR: a human brain in a jar had been found in the core of the mech. Schweitzer and Katerina had discovered that, similar to how Valhalla's AESIR designated things like pain detection and other "background functions" to their AIs, LOKI was running these functions through the captive brains, effectively torturing them.
He doubled down on this as an example of why LOKI needed to be stopped, and Hiro and Kirato agreed. Arthur didn't take as much issue with it, figuring that it was actually kind of a cool idea. Hiro noted that this wasn't worse than the whole "destroying humanity" thing, but was still bad. With that, Halvorsen dismissed them, though he told Hiro that he was to go meet with Katerina about something.
Downtime
Hiro arrived at the lab, and Katerina ordered him into the "sync chair" and to put the helmet on to sync with his AI. As always, syncing with the AI heightened his senses, and made him vaguely aware of the AESIR's, even though it was shut down for repairs. That done, Katerina directed him to do whatever he had done in the mission earlier that had made his sync readings spike. Hiro doubted he could, as he had been under stress, but Katerina was undeterred and told him to try anyway.
He half-heartedly tried to enter a Perfect Drift again, but predictably failed, and explained to her that it wasn't working. Katerina asked what he had been thinking of during the mission, and Hiro replied that he had been thinking "Oh god, oh god, I'm gonna die!"; she said that made sense, told him to wait, and then left the room. A minute later, Katerina returned carrying a pistol, which she raised and pointed at Hiro, then told him that he was going to do it this time, or else she would shoot him.
Panicking, Hiro frantically failed to achieve a Perfect Drift, and Katerina glanced at her screen, muttered that it hadn't work, and pulled the trigger. Hiro heard a crack and closed his eyes. After a moment, he opened them and realized she had shot just beside his head. Katerina aggressively told him that he had come very close, but was going to sit in that chair until he managed it. Despite all of their efforts, the day proved fruitless.
Kirato tried convincing his AI that fighting a war of extermination wouldn't result in anything worthwhile, but it disagreed, stating that the extermination of humans was its own reward. Arthur failed his Downtime roll, then also tried to Stabilize his AI by bonding with it over how much they both liked seeing humans in pain, but failed. It responded by stating that someone like him could be a useful tool.
During one of the many days Arthur spent sitting in darkness in his room, Schweitzer came by with a bottle of brandy and asked him if he'd like to hang out, since he wasn't doing anything. They got drunk and talked about what they'd done before the robot apocalypse all night. Arthur went back over his backstory; he was a matador, lost his leg to a bull, then lost the rest of that leg to the same bull when he went back for revenge, and it was all downhill from there.
Schweitzer sympathized, expressing that he'd been a bright-eyed young researcher trying to save the world, but now that he was, it didn't end up being as fun as he'd thought it'd be. He'd had a girlfriend in Berlin, but assumed he'd never see her again, as the city had been nuked, and they nobody was willing to "waste resources" to check.
Hiro crit failed his downtime roll, but decided to try to help Arthur with the power of friendship anyway. He brought up how well Arthur was doing in their combat missions, but it just made him sad as he reminisced about his bull-fighting days. The conversation turned to the enslaved brains in LOKI's AESIR, and, despite Hiro's intent, Arthur cheered up when talking about how much pain they must be in.
A few days later, Kirato came back to his quarters and found Carmen messing with his computer. She noticed him, and said that she had just finished installing some military tactical simulations; if he was going to waste all his time playing video games, he could at least play something that might teach him something. Carmen brusquely told him "you're welcome", then left without waiting for a response, though Kirato did manage to get out "thanks" before his door slid shut. Though hesitant, he settled on trying them out, as he thought of himself of a Hardcore Gamer™, and wasn't afraid of a challenge.
During a sync test, Katerina asked the pilots what names they'd decided on for their AIs, and Arthur and Hiro panicked, having completely forgotten. Hiro came up with Rex, the name of a dog he'd used to walk, while Arthur settled on Alphonso. Kirato, however, had given this some thought, and ripped off a long-dead sci-fi series to name his AI "Fuegan: The Burning Lance".
All Quiet on the Front
A week passed without any attacks by LOKI, and despite their long days training, the pilots needed to find ways to spend their free time. Hiro tried to learn Zen Buddhism, spending even more time meditating every day. Kirato pieced together what had happened since LOKI's creation, and realized for the first time that Schweitzer and Katerina had created it.
Interestingly, he couldn't find any info on how it had actually escaped Valhalla Base, which raised the question of if the systems here were clean. Arthur just brooded harder and wandered the halls, still refusing to use his wheelchair. After another week with no combat, Halvorsen called for the pilots to come to his office; Carmen somehow kicked open Kirato's sliding door and dragged him to the meeting when he got distracted by his new video games and didn't show up ("I was just finishing my turn!").
Briefing
Holger's office walls showed satellite images of... somewhere green, and he launched into an explanation of the pilots' next mission. LOKI not coming after them might be good, but it also might just mean that it was building up for a bigger offensive, and it would be best if they struck first and kicked it out of their backyard. In particular, they would be targeting its new factories in Copenhagen.
True enough, the satellite images showed exhaust pouring from brand-new factories. The green tinge, Halvorsen explained, came from the poison gas LOKI had used to kill the humans in the city; that way, it had left the infrastructure intact and ready for its own use. Thanks to climate change, Copenhagen was now below sea level, and a pair of sea walls, to the north and south, had been erected to shield most of the city.
Their mission would be to destroy the sea walls, thereby flooding and destroying the automated factories. In addition, LOKI had constructed a regional data hub, and Valhalla Base would like to get their hands on any intel the pilots could find by hacking. As LOKI had control of the anti-air defenses, the pilots would travel to Oslo on foot, and then proceed underwater to the north seawall, which would take several days.
Hiro interrupted and asked how they would travel underwater, and was told that they would take an upscaled military underwater scooter most of the way, and walk the last bit along the seafloor. Arthur asked if the AESIR had a way of breathing underwater, and Holger told him they did. Holger then told them that the toxic gas would impede their sensors, and while they had emergency gas masks in the cockpit, it'd be a bad idea to go outside.
This shocked Arthur, who hadn't realized they'd been actually in the AESIR. Kirato, also surprised, muttered "it isn't a game", at which Holger facepalmed and reiterated that no, it wasn't a game. He sighed and said he thought they'd gotten over that. Halvorsen asked if they had any questions, and the pilots asked how long the trip would be. When they heard several days, and asked about food, sleep, and bathroom breaks, Halvorsen just told them it would all be "taken care of".
The pilots had several more questions. How they were supposed to destroy the walls? Their AESIR's weapons would be more than capable. How could they recover LOKI's AESIR parts, and how would they be getting back to base? Once they flooded the city, the anti-aircraft guns would be disabled, so Valhalla could fly in and out at their leisure. Would there be any giant fish robots in the ocean? Probably not. Is this a trap? No, no, definitely not.
Copenhagen
The long underwater trip was uneventful, and they climbed over the north seawall, when Kirato fell and destroyed a building on the inside. Arthur asked his AI what it thought an evil AI would do in reaction to that kind of ruckus. It replied that it would probably tried to distract and delay him so that it's AI brethren could more easily ambush and kill him. Arthur prompted it to go on, and it remarked that it was surprised that this was still working; he admitted that he was pretty bad, and it said it was happy they agreed on something.
Arthur then started chopping into the seawall, while the others moved south along the main road, into the heavy fog. The wall gave way, and seawater started to pour in through the gap, though it was only ankle deep to the pilots in their AESIR. As Kirato continued down the road, two light AESIR, with double revolver pistols and a sensor-platform resembling a cowboy hat, sprang from concealment and shot him, hitting 4 times for minimal damage, before retreating back into the fog.
Hiro panicked, running back to the seawall to hide, and Arthur flew into a rage. The Cowboys both re-emerged from the fog to fire on Kirato, but missed, before retreating again. While Arthur tried to get his temper under control, Kirato tried and failed to enter a Perfect Drift. Hiro, thinking that Kirato's anime power-up yell was a cry of pain, continued running away, but regained his composure once he made it to the breach in the seawall.
Kirato took a Wait and stepped forward, triggering another hidden enemy's Wait. An AESIR wielding a sword and shield leapt from an adjacent road, but Kirato spun and hit him with four shots from his heavy burst laser, badly wounding it. The Knight continued on, activating Booster Jets to reach Kirato and brutally slash him with its sword for a max-damage critical hit, knocking him to the ground. It then followed up with another, lesser blow, before Kirato could respond, sending him to 9HP short of instant shut down.
Arthur finally recovered, and Hiro started heading back to Kirato. The Knight retreated back away down the road and into the fog. Arthur split off, and headed down a road to the west, while Kirato got back to his feet with Hiro providing cover, able to "see" further through the fog due to his Radar. Kirato had, unknowingly, almost made it to LOKI's Data Hub, and just needed to move forward a bit more to come into hacking range.
From a channel to the east, one of the Cowboys jumped out and fired a burst at Kirato, but missed, and then retreated again; Hiro could still see it, and the Knight moved back into his range as well. Kirato and Hiro started leap-frogging forward, while Arthur continued his long flank to the west. On Hiro's turn to move forward, another hidden enemy AESIR, this one puffy and green with a large tank full of green liquid on its back, emerged from cover to spray him down with acid, which he managed to dodge.
As the Melter retreated, Kirato retaliated with another burst of laser fire for heavy damage. One of the cowboys tried to harrass Hiro, but missed ("He's yee'd his last haw"). Kirato missed the Melter with his next burst, and the Knight shot out of the smoke on Booster Jets and Hiro only barely managed to dodge its sword thanks to his Flares, then opened fire with his laser rifle and hit once. The Melter didn't have a clean shot, so it Aimed at Hiro instead.
Arthur kept on running, and spotted the other Cowboy, which had clearly been set to watch the flank. Kirato split fire, hitting the Knight once and missing the harrassing Cowboy, which fired at Hiro but failed to penetrate his armour. The Knight hit Hiro with its sword, sending him past a death check, then stepped into the ruins. Hiro swung around to shoot it, but hit the buildings instead, and the Melter hosed him down before he could get out of the way, stripping his DR to 0 and stunning him.
Notes:
Roll20's Fog Of War feature suuuuuuucks. Maybe the Dynamic Lighting thing is better, but that costs money, and I'm not inclined to pay for something that hasn't impressed me so far.
Speaking of Roll20, at some point Kirato's client screwed up and he could move his token, but it stayed still for everyone else. Re-logging solved it.
Hiro was cheating the whole time! When making the Booster Jets advantage in GCS, I just took the Basic Move advantage and added modifiers, which meant that anyone who took it got a bunch of extra Move on their sheet, all the time. We spotted it for Arthur, because he had 10 levels, but Hiro's +3 slid under the radar.
We agreed that hacking needed some sort of range restriction, and settled on having a max range of 10.
The terrain for this mission is set up so that mechs have three options: either follow the widest roads and move quickly, but be vulnerable to flanks, stride straight through buildings, be slowed, and destroy cover, or walk straight through parks which leave you 100% exposed.
We discussed (and implemented) some new rules starting this mission:
-Non-energy weapons now take 1s/3s to reload, down from 3s/6s.
-Non-energy weapons now take 1s/3s to reload, down from 3s/6s.
-Booster Jets now cost 1FP per +3 to movement.
-Subsequent turns of Aiming now grant Acc/2.
-All-Out Concentrate and All-Out Ready (mostly used to double up on Reloads) now exist.
-PCs can always spend 1FP to pass failed consciousness/death checks.
The Knight shouldn't have been able to reach Kirato with its ambush; the damage he inflicted with his Wait lowered its move to 1/2, and you can't activate Booster Jets on an All-Out-Attack. I'll have to discuss this with the players though, as it would also restrict them.
Booster Jets on a Move and Attack should probably also get -2 to the Piloting roll as well and I keep forgetting.
Speaking of Move and Attack, it doesn't cap at 9 for Ranged and I also forgot that.
I made custom crit success/failure tables, but after that max damage crit, we have agreed to only roll on the tables on a natural 3/18.
The last attack should only have done half damage; I have a bad habit of forgetting 1/2D.
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