Finally, as the timer draws closer to zero you take query your databases on the equipment Ivanova was wearing before. An enhancement visor, likely with dozens of visual and audible modes, various awareness enhancement features, HUD, and auto-targeting systems. A combat belt full of what you assume are all kinds of nasties. Modified Armada Ops assault rifle, designed for small team operations, variable magnification scope, tracking mode, yet more visual enhancements; single, burst, and full auto modes along with a variable length barrel for close quarters combat and long distance accuracy. Your own mode (and you assume hers as well)l still has all of the lethal options -- lasers, grasers, ultra-light lance, and flux-bolts in addition to standard projectile modes. And then her armor; resembles Armada Ops gear in many respects but you note a large number of changes. Material changes, some sort of surface sheeting, and a few micro-bead form shield generators embedded into the flexible suit. Rare, ludicrously expensive. Still, you imagine those won’t be active... mere shock rounds couldn’t hope to penetrate a shield, after all.

Two things bother you, though. First, none of it save the heavily modified assault rifles is standard issue. You have little doubt -- especially after seeing the micro-generators -- that every piece is custom designed and heavily modified. Next, the leads from her implants into the suit and visor. They belie something far more than simple combat armor, likely transforming her equipment into actual extensions of herself and opening up an entirely new range of possibilities... powered enhancement servos, 360-degree awareness, enhanced mobility, and more Too much to list.

You know that Armada Elite Ops teams receive top-of-the-line custom gear, but not of this level. And that worries you more than anything else, beyond even the match. Kit like that isn’t handed out on an official basis -- even within Intel, from what you’ve seen and heard through the years. And most certainly not to analysts, supervisors, or even normal agents.

Occupied with your thoughts you nearly miss the starting signal. Nearly, but not quite. You burst into action, quickly running into cover and directing your drone legions into the bay. Doors swish open and they begin filing in... only to slam closed a few moment later, barely a dozen of them having made it inside. You query the system and find a level-5 decompression alarm has been triggered, along with the blast-bolts having seized in place... an interruption in the control systems triggered on a delay 23 minutes ago.

It seems your XO’s long absence from the bay was not all spent changing.

>During this match you will get 3 excellence points
>Whenever you use one the action will be enhanced to the peak of your (considerable) abilities
>Note: This does not assure success, just that when one is used you will be at the absolute top of your game for that *one* action. If you use it to shoot you will calculate a perfect trajectory. If you use it in hand-to-hand your reflexes will be boosted to the peak of your abilities. And so on.
>This does not mean every action in an entire update will be enhanced. Only the specific thing you use it on will be.

First thing we do is duck and cover.

We have numbers, she does not.

Our drones can heard her towards us and keep her from sneaking out of view.

==Map Legend==
Green Dotted Arrow: Current Jump
Orange Dotted Arrow: Last Jump
Yellow Dotted Arrow: Last minus 1 Jump
Red Dotted Arrow: Prior jumps.
Green dot: Current position.
Yellow Square: Your awakening position
Teal dotted zone: Hundred Systems Territory (Hundred Worlds Rebellion)

==Command Staff==
Lieutenant Kateryna Ivanova - Executive Officer
>Second Lieutenant Dray Parson - Intelligence Officer (Incapacitated)
Second Lieutenant Robert Tynes - Steward
Chun-Fan Dai - Chief Engineer
Third Lieutenant Mardigan “Guns” Rinn - Weapons Officer
Dr. Christof Burr - Physician

==Junior Officers==
Ensign Fie - Communictions Officer
Ensign DuBois - Staff officer
Ensign Tremko - Staff officer
Ensign Rao - Staff officer

==Persons of Note==
Dr. Eliphim Ketro -- Civilian Scientist

>>15783493
>anything goes
>Oh she wouldn't use a shield, that'd be unfair
I take it that means we can't use our shield then?
Oh, and out of interest, what are the properties of these shields? Do they stop physical objects, energy weapons, both? Can you see through them?

Previous Threads:

1: http://suptg.thisisnotatrueending.com/archive/15474877/
2: http://suptg.thisisnotatrueending.com/archive/15527576/
3: http://suptg.thisisnotatrueending.com/archive/15547424/
4: http://suptg.thisisnotatrueending.com/archive/15558914/
5: http://suptg.thisisnotatrueending.com/archive/15581324/
6: http://suptg.thisisnotatrueending.com/archive/15603188/
7: http://suptg.thisisnotatrueending.com/archive/15626860/
8: http://suptg.thisisnotatrueending.com/archive/15671288/
9: http://suptg.thisisnotatrueending.com/archive/15681393/
10: http://suptg.thisisnotatrueending.com/archive/15702140/
11: http://suptg.thisisnotatrueending.com/archive/15725852/
12: http://suptg.thisisnotatrueending.com/archive/15749179/
13: http://suptg.thisisnotatrueending.com/archive/15760403/
13-2: http://suptg.thisisnotatrueending.com/archive/15765549/

Well let's check the optics all over the arena and the optics of every droid and get a lock on her position. Ideally, we find out where she is, then stick our gun around a corner and use our vast array of optics and computer-aided aiming to nail her without revealing any part of ourself sans hands.

Can we scan the bay with the ship's sensors? Or would that give everyone a nice case of cancer?

>>15783504
Drones should be set to scan varying spectrums to try and get over any cammouflage she might be attempting.

She could also be moving through conduits to small for drones to fit.

I propose we stay mobile, but array some of our drones to give the impression of protecting us; in truth they'd be protecting nothing at all. Hopefully that'd lure her in. The rest of the drones could be performing sweeps to try and flush her out, and our human body should be self-reliant.

>>15783501
She will likely take out the drones (only temporary disabling, but still), as soon as she can. It's obvious she has anticipated our actions at least that far. But we can use that to our advantage.

Send one drone to a spot where it will have a good view of the area, not totally inconspicuous but still relatively hidden, and use it as bait. Have another drone nearby, well hidden, and have it observe to see when/if she takes it out. Then, trace the trajectory back and send a few drones in to distract her while we head in.

It's not much, but it's something, I think.

>>15783577
She'll probably try and destroy or hack the drones, we should try and prepare for that.

>>15783542
>I take it that means we can't use our shield then?
You don't have a personal shield...

>Oh, and out of interest, what are the properties of these shields? Do they stop physical objects,
Yes

>energy weapons?
Yes

>Can you see through them?
Yes. They sort of shimmer, like a heat-haze.

Wait, if her suit has assist servos, we could try and hack it and lock her in place, might be worth a shot. I assume that as an EI we would have an advantage in electronic warfare. Speaking of which, can our ECM systems mess with electronics inside the ship?

>>15783596
>You don't have a personal shield...
She's fighting both our bodies. You said that the Dreadnought could project its shield around Earth so I thought maybe we could try projecting our shield around our human body. I assumed they only stopped energy (which is why we needed point defence for the missiles) and that would force her to use the tazer. Oh well.

>>15783609
>we could try and hack it and lock her in place
Fun fact, there's no actual reason a military device would have some sort of wireless LAN for you to try and tap into. Maybe if you spent a few hours disassembling the armor and physically screwed with and then linked to the micro control systems.

>>15783630
>You said that the Dreadnought could project its shield around Earth
Yes, because as a stationary defense platform with the sole task of guarding earth it was designed to do that.

>we could try projecting our shield around our human body
No, does not work that way. It's a ship shield.

>>15783639
I'm sure we had some anti-boarding/infiltration training. Anything important that has been drilled into us not to be forgotten?

First thing we might be interested in is disabling all access to whatever networks we have in the area.

>>15783575

Cancer shmancer. Flood the bay with every advanced sensing system we have, using the drones as piggyback repeaters where needed. Acoustic, EM, thermal, chem tracers, power output localizers, the works.

How possible is it to set up for double and triple feints? Have the drones herding toward a killbox only serviceable from a certain sniper's post, which is vulnerable from this flank, and we set up to hit whatever moves to intercept that third tangent? Can we have drones tasked to every position in case the redundancy is overkill?

>>15783639

What about point blank EMP / forced induction / scrambling?

>>15783672
>I'm sure we had some anti-boarding/infiltration training. Anything important that has been drilled into us not to be forgotten?
The usual procedure goes:
>Lock all doors remotely and disable control systems
>Vent atmosphere to space and/or superpressurize it to crush them then vent remains to space
>Nullify/overcharge gravity on anyone left and then vent remains
>If anything is left standing deploy automated internal defense turrets and your small contingent of anti-boarding drones (note, you don't have THAT many of these, they are mainly around key areas)
>Laugh

Boarding actions in space are pretty much suicide though, it was never considered a big enough threat for comprehensive measures beyond these.

>>15783779

Yeah, the crush-vent-crush-villainous laughter cycle almost always works, in a universe absent SPESS MEHRENS and plot armor.

She seems better equipped than us, but our advantage is that we have the ship.
-we can't use it's weapons or shields
-we can't move it or jump to disorientate her
-we have got sensors and drones
-she has just demonstrated that she can hack us without us noticing so we can't really trust those sensors and drones
Looking good so far. Er, what about gravity, can we alter that or is it spin induced?

so we could hit her with increased gravity? Surely that would be useful, if for little more than slowing her down

>>15783826

From Vedi's prior discussion of anti-boarding, gravity is at our whim. The downside is, whatever we do to her, we do to ourselves.

Vedi, we're not RPing paralysis through analysis right now, are we? Because we need to be fucking moving in-game, not contemplating our best course of YOU'RE ALREADY DEAD.

>>15783826
>>15783779
Oh ok, so we have gravity. Awesome. The rest of the crew might not like us playing around with it with no warning, but that's their problem.

>>15783836
or make it zero grav and have her float up and we get a shot or two off

then turn it back on before she gets too high

>>15783779
Hmm, I think crushing our XO might count as a phyrric victory. We couldn't even claim our bet.

Could we have any chance to track any of the stuff she's using, now that we've got a glimpse at it?

As everything is allowed, maybe consult our resident cybernetics engineer if he has any idea how to track super-plus level infiltrator gear?

>>15783779

The drones can scout for her and we can follow at a non-descript distance so that if she does anything to the drone then we'll know about it while still being in a safe position.

>>15783852
We don't have to crush her. Just turning gravity the other way up when we're expecting it and she's not gives us an advantage. Constant transition from 0 to 2 gees will make it very hard for her to move around stealthily while we can compensate for it.

>>15783862
>Implying she will do anything to the drones.

>>15783862

Once she's revealed herself then we can react appropriately via lasers.

>>15783875

Well if she doesn't then our drones can use their sensors to find her.

>>15783874

I like the idea of timed variable flux, 0-2g, set to an interval only we can know.

>>15783874
>Just turning gravity the other way up when we're expecting it and she's not gives us an advantage

The area is filled with wrecked space ships. I think a lot of things can go wrong if we reverse gravity.

>>15783909
>Implying she hasent already stealth hacked the drones to make them far less effective.

Cmon use your brain, we ARE the ship. We can use that to our advantage, like the grav fuckery or the atmosphere tampering ideas used so far.

>>15783923
Good eye. Yes, there are some things with delicate equipment in here. You had Dai and Tynes go through the stocks to weed out the crap, if you will remember.

That said, there's nothing /stopping/ you from floating everything up and then crashing it down at two gees.

>>15783952

Then I'd like to pass on the KROM SMASH option. Getting beaten by the XO is less important than the mission. Yes, even with the end-goal of "get in her panties".

Can we make our gravity fuckery only effect this hold? I am less enthusiastic about throwing around our entire crew and all our supplies.

>>15783952
Oh, also, just manipulating the gravity between .5 and 2.5 gees probably wouldn't damage anything unless you tumbled over a mound of debris or whatever.

>>15783952
Just because it's weightless doesn't mean it's going to start randomly floating around without a force to set it into motion. Just to be safe we can vary it from 1 to 2 gees then. Nothing will move and it'd have to be seriously delicate equipment to break just because it's a bit heavier.

>>15784021
Temporarily remove all access to the ship systems for Kateryna. It won't stop her, I think, but it might buy us a few precious seconds.

>>15783991
I guess so, otherwise we would not only destroy potential boarders, but also our crew.

I'd say we load the command to increase the gravity into our fast access memory. Just in case she gets a shot on us, that might make the projectiles miss.

>>15783779

Ved, do the drones have holographic projecting technology on them? Or does anything available to us have that?

>>15784021
Ok then, for the whole duration of the exercise, have the gravity in the hold vary randomly between 0.5 and 2 gees. That should through her off a bit.

>>15784074
>make the projectiles miss by increasing gravity
It'd have to be a /really/ long range shot for that to have any chance of success. Those things move pretty fast, you know.

>>15784118
>Those things move pretty fast, you know.

Spaceship EI?

wait for her to make the first move, use all drones to scan everything as much as possible. Be that camping bastard and screenwatcher.

Also, I'm suspecting acoustic sensors she might be using, so put on some distracting music if possible or use our own method of acoustic sensing to find her.

>>15783676
>>15783584
>>15784118
Okay, so the basic gist of what we're going to do is randomly cycle the gravity between 0.5 and 2 G's, while we set up a triple feint trap as our initial opening moves.
That sound about right?

You flick on your internal sensors, scanning the bay. Optical, infra-red, and spectral analysis yield nothing while RADAR and LADAR yield far too much from the riot of projections around the bay. At the very least you don’t see her in any of the open tracts between debris fields.

Stymied, you crank the gravity to 2x as you move deeper into the pile -- not a hindrance to you thanks to your extensive internal augmentation, but perhaps Ivanova is not so lucky. Before long you’ve found what you’re looking for, a constrained area with limited fields of fire and even fewer approaches. You look around and scan visually before stealthily climbing into an isolated and nearly invisible sniperhole before gathering the dozen drones at your disposal. Setting half into a patrolling pattern around the area ‘you’ would supposedly be in and the other half on a slowly expanding network of patrols, you wait.

Minutes pass, motionless tension beginning to eat at your nerves. Still nothing, and your patrol drones have canvassed half of the open spaces in the bay... then a flicker of movement. You focus optical sensors on the area and attempt to look yourself, craning your neck and zooming your own personal optics in as far as possible. Ah the wonders of technology.

There she is.

Resting in an extremely concealing sniper shanty atop the highest point in the bay, she is laying flat on her stomach with gun at the ready. Gazing through the scope, you see that she has zoned in on the area contained within your defensive drone patrols. Waiting.

>Wat do?

>>15784224

"And one hour later, the Void Quest players have come to a consensus"

>>15784245
Oh, and it's a difficult shot from where you are but not impossible. You will have to slightly reorient yourself within your hidey-hole to bring your weapon to bear, though, since you didn't expect her to be so far away.

>>15784245
Illusions, illusions everywhere. She has had too long to set up now.
Move the ring of defensive drones elsewhere, she if she shifts her gunsights. If so its her, if not a hologram and she moving towards the vacated area, a perfect opportunity for an ambush.

>>15784245

All drones to her position! Flush her out and we'll take her out!

>>15784269
DO NOT SHIFT POSITION!!!! Thats what she is waiting for.

>>15784284
This seems like a good idea, we should make sure she didn't anticipate us using the drones as a cover.

>>15784269
As far as we know, could Ivanova utilize decoys of some sort?

Like holograms or something?

>>15784165
It doesn't matter how fast we react. Gravity is a force, it accelerates the bullet downwards, it doesn't instantly suck it to the floor. The bullet may hit a little lower than she expected but to get it to miss in the fraction of a second the bullet is travelling we'd have to increase the gravity to stupidly high levels.

I say burn one of our badass points to score first blood.

If we're REALLY lucky we might land two shots.

In conjunction with whatever other tactics we end up settling on.

Before we do anything, we should work out other locations to hole up if this one is compromised.

>>15784284

This. Move the drones, have the forward screen assault an advantageous position. Ivanova moves, BURN TWO POINTS and acquire target-fire. If not, we push assets toward our six and reposition.

Question: how loud is the rifle, if we fire and miss, will she know?

>>15784361
WE ONLY HAVE 3 POINTS!

>>15784284
Supporting this.
I also think we should use an excellence point if it's confirmed to be her and not a visual decoy.
Of course, right after shooting her, we should scoot away to another location, with a drone taking our place on the high ground, and drones covering the points of attack, and then us covering those drones.

>>15784363
Yes. There is a brief energy spike as it discharges and some noise since there are no modification to prevent either present. From a few light scratches where such things would be mounted you can see that said implements must have been removed. Worry not, your perfect recall tells you that the ones on hers were likewise removed.

She might have placed several decoys in an attempt to figure out where we are.

I support the idea of using a drone to flush her out, and if she responds to it, burn an excellence point and blam her. If it's a decoy, then hide like a motherfucker.

>>15784430

This anon makes sense, I support him in all endeavors.

>>15784372

I'm suggesting WIN parameters. The third is a fall-back in case she's outmaneuvered us. But BURN TWO is a guaranteed win if we're actually hitting Ivanova with actual fire. One to reposition without giving our position away, one for the "kill".

>>15784422


I thought we agreed to randomly adjust the gravity between 0.5 and 2.5 Gs at random time intervals to make it hard for her to move. It can be really frustrating to try and walk when you suddenly weigh over twice as much.

We should slip out of our hole and move - difficult but not impossible? This woman is basically an Alienware Terminator. She could probably put a bolt in from her quarters.

Send a drone toward her decoy/real her and have it open fire. Send it via the ground, in cover. While she is distracted with it, we move out of our hole and start moving.

We should also get one drone up into an unobtrusive spot, a corner in the ceiling as surveillance.

>>15784510
Yeah, I was figuring something like this: we'd know when the changes were coming and could compensate for them but she wouldn't. Doesn't really matter at the moment though because she's stationary anyway, and it'd probably be hard to calculate our sniper shot with that.

>>15784585
If we've put her stationary with the grav fuckery then it shouldn't be too hard to flush her out. Also see if she shifts her gunsight when grav switches again. This is a clear sign of whether or not that really her.

>Atmosphere
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6sZVZJOfIC8

Too much time has passed, and your second isn’t foolish enough to expose herself in that manner. At least you think. But there is one way to make sure.

You slowly guide two of the patrolling drones toward the tall sniper post, moving them upward as subtly as possible... not very, it turns out. The crashes of debris as they scale the pile awkwardly causes several Ivanova to shift slightly, looking over. That’s all you need.

You quickly shift to the right and sight in on her, the trajectory pre-computed and perfect. The crosshairs move into position and safety off, mere fractions of a second having passed but already you see her reacting. She twists, her gun swiveling as you prepare to fire and... moving away from you, to her right.

Wait.

You throw yourself backward, enhanced reflexes moving faster than any human and randomly shifting gravity as you do so. Where you were a split second before two shock-bullets land in rapid succession, nearly striking you and likely already in the air when you started to move. Instead they catch only air and steel, slamming into the rear of your position and discharging their powerful arcs of electricity into it rather than you. The report follows, two muted pops from your left. You look up and see ‘Ivanova’ swivel back toward you and two more shots ring out; this time they strike the drones ascending the mountain of metal in the back, expertly threading past the metal overlays and striking power conduits. The current courses through them, overloading their suppression systems and temporarily disabling them even as you watch ‘Ivanova’ roll to the left and vanish into thin air... the gentle glow of a portable holoprojector in the now vacant position.

>1 EP spent
>wat do nao?

>>15784678
I FUCKING KNEW IT!

So now we hunt her. Sector exclusion, scan down to the nanowave level if possible. Identify every object as non-organic before moving. Cordon, control, flush, and strike. Be aggressive, and task four drones to take fire for us.

Would it be possible to throw this match up on screens around the ship for the rest of the crew to watch?

If it wouldn't kill our processing power, it might be fun for the crew to watch from any internal cameras/sensors.

>>15784739
NO!!!!!!! Private match only.

>>15784678
Can we pump out white noise in order to counter any acoustic sensors that Ivanova has running?
And can we alter our body's temperature to not be as obvious on thermals?

Move to another position, have the drones set up another apparent trap, and then watch the best place that would provide a shot on where we 'should' be.

>>15784739

This is a command staff-building (and possibly poon-getting) exercise. She wins, it bolsters her morale while still protecting our position at the top of the org charts. We win, she saves face and she's motivated to push her well-advanced limits. Rule #2 of command: never let the subordinates see that the command staff can fail.

>>15784770

She isn't going to fall for that twice. Instead, take up position to fire on the spot with the cleanest shot to where we'd be hiding if we tried to get a clean shot on the best spot for where we're setting the trap.

>>15784792
Besides, it adds to our allure when all they have to go off of is rumors about how the second match went down.

(In before Dai is watching anyway.)

>>15784770

And beyond this: can we push white noise, then shut it down, in an attempt to detect acoustic compensators? She'd still broadcast for a split second until the compensators caught on to the new paradigm, but a split second is all we need.

Other spoofing and disorientation routines are strongly advised. Lighting pulses designed to overwhelm adaptive systems and obscure the battlefield, thermal variance designed around exposing a breathing human. (She DOES breathe, right?)

>>15784820
If it's a real self-contained suit, she might not.
Or at least, it might not be detectable without specialized equipment.

>>15784845

If fully contained rebreather, hopefully we can deploy either drone assets or sensors which can detect organics via smell or EM signature. If so, we look for anything that's not us.

increase the temperature to something that we can take but might be inhibiting to a human.

>>15784820
>She DOES breathe, right?
You're not sure. Obviously she does in day-to-day activities, but with the suit...? The holo was completely motionless but that might have just been it not picking up on the slight motions of breathing. And you do know of ops wear that can siphon lactic acid from muscles to keep them fresh and provide oxygen directly to the bloodstream, among other things.

But you have no idea if her suit has these capabilities.

>>15784881

Assume that her suit can handle superhuman heat, cold, and pressure variance, damn near up to hard vacuum. An assassin wins by being where an ordinary person cannot.

>>15784904

Okay, was she breathing when she was suited and before we broke for separate corners?

>>15784913
Yes, she had to or she wouldn't have been able to talk to you otherwise. Vocal chords and all.

>>15784921
Open the cargo bay doors, Ged.

>>15784936
Kinda goes beyond the nonlethal scope of the match though, doesn't it?

>>15784921
>>15784913
That could have just been because she needed to talk, and didn't want to give away all of her suit's abilities.
We have to assume that her suit is capable of everything we can do, and more.

>>15784921

Then was there an obvious, visible rebreather amongst her various and sundry gear? We can always assume that she has such capability, but confirmation shows us that route is folly.

>>15784936
No, Dont do this. My god, even if she has the equipment, we dont want to risk killing our second over a silly high tech "paintball" Game by jettisoning her into space.

>>15784936

We're not killing or maiming our XO to win a skirmish.

>>15784936

Play Laser-tag against Ivanova
>adviceharbinger.jpg
Space her!

I really meant to mention this but forgot.

The holo you saw had a full helmet on, the visor being a part of it. Assuming it was a real time image then she likewise would have had that on.

Sorry if this changes your plans.

>>15784996
Open the cargo bay doors.

>>15784996
Are we able to tell where the holo was receiving the image from? Cuz it was moving in real time along with her.

>>15785035
Don't open the Cargo Doors.

>Reading the thread
>get here >>15784245
>get ready to post that it is a trap and we should do something to determine if it is a holographic projection or not
> >>15784678

DAMMIT!

All we can do is move before she finds another position.

she's going for another sniper post

look for potential posts, and flush them with a drone each.

also have the drones gather at one place, make her think we;re preparing for a defense.

>You throw yourself backward, enhanced reflexes moving faster than any human and randomly shifting gravity as you do so.
> randomly shifting gravity as you do so.

Hah!
We can use gravity manipulation for lots of things. Like increasing the gravity so that we can duck faster or shifting it around so that Ivanova has harder time aiming and such.

Make more use of gravity manipulation!

>Also, don't open the cargo bays, what the fuck man

Can we just timeskip to after we've won?

>>15785057
Other people said that in the correct timeframe already.
>>15784334
>>15784408
>>15784430
The first part of the post you're 'DAMMIT'ing about:
>your second isn’t foolish enough to expose herself in that manner. At least you think. But there is one way to make sure.
i.e. we suspect it's just a hologram and decided to test it. She apparently still managed to fool us.

>>15785105
FUCK YOU, YOU LAZY FAGGOT!

>>15785105
>implying you will definitely win

>>15785105
I can see how skipping levels in recent Wii games got popular...

This is a quest... what you want is a book.

>>15785122
Can we just timeskip to after we've lost by trying something stupid like bumping her gently with Parson?

>>15785122
>Implying a lesser GM wouldn't crush us just to spite anon.

>>15785105
Right now it is looking like a timeskip would be after we lose.

I am unclear on some things, like are we out of her line of fire? Do we know her approximate position? Or are we still in danger and in the dark? I have to say that Ivanova seems to just be better at this than we are, and better geared for this nonlethal challenge.

>>15784820
>>15784770
>>15784737

I second These

>>15785080
we should also think about causing as much chaos as possible. doing things like break down piles of useless shit and such. and keep on the move, preferably in cover, continuing random gravity fluctuations. start using alarm noises and such. bring the room temp to body temp. hope things heat up quickly enough.

also: how visible is our uniform?

>>15785153
All of those DO sound good.
It's certainly better than trying to vent the compartment into space.

>>15785129

>>15785153
I agree with this anons agreement

Internally cursing, you roll over and slide down the back of the pile you were situated on while simultaneously triangulating the shots and reviewing the footage of the area in question. There she is, sitting in concealment much like your own, swiveling and firing before immediately rolling to the side and dropping down a sheer thirty-foot fall. She lands lightly and silently, immediately sprinting off, turning slightly and giving a thumbs-up toward one of your sensors as she disappears into a blind spot.

You have no time to lose. You assemble the rest of the drones and have them converge on the area she was headed into, simultaneously scanning the area with all your sensors... then a thought hits you. She was running completely silently. Noise compensators.

You flash out to the dozens of speakers throughout the cargo bay, turning them up to maximum and flooding the area with modulated varying pulses. Nothing. Wait, no. Ever so slight. You focus on the area and run intense vector calculations... yes right there. For an instant there was a noise variance on the return, quickly stopping and likely now being compensated for. She is moving to a position overlooking the area your drones are congregating in to search, or at least was before the pulses if she hasn’t guessed their purpose. Either way, you’re moderately close at hand and can begin closing the net even tighter.

You pull four of your remaining ten drones back, forming a shield as you sprint through bay, noise pulses synchronized to cover your movements. Piles of scrap and steel flash by, blurred walls signaling your rapid progress in chasing your elusive prey.

You are brought up short as a round slams into the drone to your left, shorting it out and sending you diving for cover behind a pile of scrap. Damn. She clearly predicted you would be coming, though in hindsight it probably wasn’t very difficult to guess. You query your other drones but they are still some distance away, hovering into positions blocking the avenues between the scrap piles that lead away from this position. They could move farther in to close the net if you desired, but that would leave some of the smaller and more debris-strewn paths without a physical presence.

Firing again she puts a round into yet another of your bodyguard drones, forcing you to pull them back into total cover as well and observing through the bay optics. You are just beginning to triangulate the shot when the calculations are rendered moot. Ivanova springs up out of a cover position behind a large unisteel block and darts across the open lane, sliding behind some debris and training her gun on your position again; the majority of her body concealed but left arm, thigh, shoulder, and side of her helmeted head exposed. A slightly tricky shot, but quite a bit less so than the one you made at the hologram.

>???.

>Just get off work
>Void Quest, FUCK YEAR
>We haven't rammed any suns or bumped any planets yet

Excuse me while I squeal and piss myself.

>>15785454

Use an excellence point to take her out.

>>15785491

By shooting her I mean.

>>15785454

Take a shot and run. If it hits, it hits; if not, keep using the pulses to track her movements. Hopefully, we can get into a position where we can box her in with our drones and move in for the "kill".

Not sure about other guys.

But I really didn't like the laser-tag time-sink from the previous thread and this one.

... No, that is not right. I like the character interaction and all, what I am trying to say that by using the quest time for this, we have less time to advance the main objective (for the moment) in the quest.
I am looking forward to the timeskip after the repairs more than this game (which, while fun eats up time like nothing else).

As for repairs, I wouldn't mind if we spend here half of the year if that means we can improve our situation even by one percentage. We really don't have to hurry anywhere.

Also, it was said that there are other alien civs which are at stalemate with there reptilian bunch. That means that those races ALSO have Ophelian tech. We should pay them a visit and take back whatever we find.

>>15785454
Take the leg shot and hope it slows her down. Immediately pull back and try to circle her, have your drones press forward and flush her out.

Use a point for the shot.

Crank the gravity to 5Gs, then shoot her.

>END thernise
Indeed, captcha.

>>15785524
Shush, we're having fun,

>>15785491
>>15785500
NO!

SAVE THE POINTS!

>>15785491
this

>>15785524
>We should pay them a visit and take back whatever we find.
I agree, but it should come AFTER we investigate those two systems with active Ophidian defenses.

>>15785500
>>15785491
I agree. Use another excellence point to shoot her. Maybe use 3-round bursts instead of just single-shots, to have a better chance of making a hit.

Make the gravity fluctuate wildly while we shoot and precalc for it.

>should we shoot her Y/N
>should we use an excelence point to shoot her Y/N

Take cover and wait for another chance.

>>15785643
y and n

she has a shield guys. it won't work

>>15785623
Use an excellence point to put a shot into her thigh.

Don't use the EP

>>15785643

Yes to both.


>mfw we win and give Ivanova back her chocolate

We haven't gotten the drop on her yet, so she's up to something. Shoot her, but save the point.

>>15785658
Using the shield would be cheating on her part.

>>15785658
mind you, shoot while getting to cover. also drones. for droning

>>15785701
no rules except non lethal
so no, it isn;t

>>15785674


I vote to use an EP to aim for the head. It might stun her enough to a few more shots into her. We should try it.

>>15785454
>turning them up to maximum and flooding the area with modulated varying pulses.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XPoiPZYbtnA @ 1:14

rolled 3 = 3

Any chance the projected figure's a decoy, and she's fully behind cover, perhaps moving to better cover now that she's caught our attention? Illusionists have always used flash and distraction to hide other actions; did she just spoof us?

Rolling out of spite.

You use your sensors to scan the area and plot a firing trajectory, loading a series of rapid gravity shifts (and calculating your shots to compensate) for when you fire. A short burst, ideally several hits. It’s go time.

You take a deep breath and swing around, the pull of gravity flux dragging at you slightly, and pull the trigger in an instant, sending the shock-bullets on their way. Your aim is true, perfect, and precise, all three round slamming into your XO.

Or rather, they would have if she was there.

You do a double-take, your own physical eyes giving you a sense of dissonance when you compare them to the bay sensors -- where you read empty space, they read Ivanova poised to shoot.

Well, at least they got the poised to shoot part right. Three slugs sing across the space between you and Ivanova’s first position, your gravity manipulations sending one to punch into a girder to the side of your head and another so close to your leg that you could feel the electric tingle. The third strikes your right forearm, causing you to grunt in pain and your hand to convulse involuntarily as you throw yourself to the side, back into cover.

That did not go at all the way you planned you think, rubbing the still-cramping limb as a tingling numbness spreads through it.

2 EP used, 1 remaining
>???

Dammit, I said she was up to something, but y'all didn't listen.
We need to stop playing her game and start playing ours.
Vent the fucking bay.

Anon sucks at this.

>>15785865
NON LETHAL you stupid bastard

>>15785824

Fuck it, find a sizable but light piece of scrap to use as a shield, gather all our bodyguard drones in front of us and charge her position then use our excellence point once we get in close combat.

>>15785873
Her suit is probably vac capable, and we can have a drone grab her after she passes out if it isn't.

>>15785824
So either she has equipment that can spoof our bay sensors, or she is hacking them actively. If it is the second we ought to be able to shut her down. If it is the first we need to figure out how this stuff works.

>>15785931
And if it isn't she fucking dies. Either way we would have to pick all this damn salvage crap up again. Some of it might even HIT station that is REPAIRING us at the moment..

>>15785944
So does that mean shes could have been watching us the entire time?

play this song

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6hzrDeceEKc

Hope that we successfully serenade her and get her into coming out.

Then blast her.

Leave the cargo bay.
There's too much crap in here for her to hide in.

I'm just wondering here. Out of curiosity. Completely leaving aside anything to do with Ivanova.

You do remember what happened last time your body was exposed to hard vacuum right? And you do know you are in this bay too?

The bay sensors, I'm assuming, use a number of different detection methods, and her illusion didn't get picked up on them.
Did the bay sensors see through the first hologram (assuming we have the processing cycles to check through the sensor logs)?
Because if she can fool our eyes but not the bay sensors, we could just go 'blind', as it were, and use the bay sensors to navigate by.

>>15785865
You stop posting, forever.

Anyways we need to get back into cover NOW! Out in the open like this we are sitting ducks.

>>15785997

Not an option. Although, we could work out a means of spoofing our position, then using drones to defend "us" while we are secreted about the debris, seeking a clear shot.

>>15786014

There's one moron calling for bay depressurization, Vedi.

Shit like this is why I don't start a quest thread.

It really comes to a point where you just gotta either pick the one smart idea and ignore the rest, or provide a/b/c/d choices for most stuff.

>>15786014
Yeah, she might be able to survive hard vacuum, but we can't. So unless the intent is to throw the game elaborately, I don't think this is a good idea.

>>15786031

Did you not read the last part of the update? We are in cover as now.

Maybe we should change tack and try this >>15785905

>>15786069
>METAL shield.
>Electrical stun bullets.
>Implying that wont turn us into a giant sized lighting rod.

>>15786132

We are wearing shock gloves remember? It wont affect us as long as we keep it a safe distance from our body out in front.

How about we reverse the direction of gravity in the bay? Yeah we are basically saying fuck it to the salvage in here, but we could at least gain momentary disorientation with it, which might be enough to get a shot off.

>>15786165
>implying friendly match is more important than supplies

You just went full retard.

>>15786165
Ummm implying that wont fuck up our shot as well?

Can i get a count of how many drones are still standing?

>>15786186
Reading is too hard for you?

Umm actually why dont we just USE OUR SECOND BODY?!?!?!? After all do the rules say the first human body down or what? Cuz if not we can use our meatpuppet as bait and then transfer into the ship to use drone to shoot her.

We're still connected to the ship, that means we can contact Dai. Have him override whatever Ivanova did and swarm the bay with drones. We should have done this from the beginning.

>>15786271
Thats a good point......

>>15786215
What? The meatpuppet IS our second body, our first being the Harbinger itself (the Harbinger's EI data core if you want to get technical).

it's probably a really derp idea, but I like the whole "take a piece of scrap metal and just tank her in close combat like a boss"

>>15786215
MFW

>>15785824
I would like to suggest a zigzagging retreat until we can move our drones into better positions. Once we've made our next attempt at figuring out where she is perform a JET STEAM ATTACK! with us and a couple of the drones.

>>15786358
*Stream
Jet stream attack

>>15786132

Ride on of our drones to get closer, use other drones for disposable cover while we make our approach.

>>15786479
>Ride one of our drones
FIXD

BTW, not the guy
>>15786132
was replying to, but all the same, I'm grasping at straws here man.

>>15786498

ahem >>15786162

Our control of the environment doesn't help much since she's more capable in that area, all we can really do is fuck with the gravity when she's not expecting it.

>>15786538

A good idea, but I still think it'd be faster to use the drones to fly over the debris. And the rest of the drones are cover themselves.

Either way we need to be certain of her position since our flanks are going to be exposed while charging.

>>15785824

Do we still have direct LOS of Ivanova with our drones?

>trying to outsnipe a spook in full spook gear

Yeah, that's not going to happen, guys.

Get Dai to open the door (get on the floor, walk the dinosaur), summon more drones, and then zerg rush kekeke. Ghosts might be able to bring down the thunder and one-shot the zerglings, but if you find the ghost, you can tear him apart.

I for one applaud Vedi for having shredded anon's consensus to bits in the span of 3 posts. This is worse than normal.

As for throwing my hat in the ring, i say we need to go blind in the eyes because they are doing nothing for us at all at this point, she has clearly hacked them.

what we could do is try to overload her sensors. over charge our laser and throw it. not enough to be lethal but enough to temporarily blind (assuming we know where she is) then get in close for hand to hand. we might win that. drones to flush her out while we're in cover.

either way, we bit off more than we can chew.

>>15786715

Where we're going, we won't need eyes to see.

Vedibere, can we override the decompression alarm and have the drones outside the bay manually retract the blastbolts? Or will it require time that we spend in hiding somewhere?

A better question. Is there any OTHER way into the bay, maybe the Ivanova doesnt know about?

Time for a change in tactics. You quickly scan the surroundings for a suitable piece, knowing what you plan will need to be executed perfectly; your eyes eventually alighting upon a hollow girder end-cap a meter away. You flick to overhead sensors and gauge the distance, both to the cap and from it to Ivanova. Hmmm. It should just work.

You signal one of the drones waiting in the wings to move closer, waiting for it to come into view. Sure enough, as soon as it rounds the corner Ivanova spins, an expertly placed shot downing the drone before whipping back around.

Still, it’s enough. You dive for the casement, the two drones with you following. Bullets ping off of the metal shield, electrifying it briefly, but you’re safe behind... and plan to be for the near future as well. You lift it with the drones, carrying it forward and shielding yourself as you go. Shots tap along the front, lighting it up once more, but your repair drones’ insulated actuators, built to easily withstand surges far more powerful, soak it up easily. Halfway there she tries another tactic, shooting below and attempting to skid the bullets into your feet, forcing you to keep your steps random as you close.

Three meters away the shots stop. She must be on the move, and you dare not trust the bay sensors, but you’re not close enough. The drones drop the casement and swing around to the sides, both seizing and dropping before so much as getting a visual.

You decide to opt for a third route.

Grasping the upper lip of the casement you flex your cybernetically enhanced muscles, launching your body into the air and over the steel bulk, twisting in the air and landing facing Ivanova.

Uh. Or not. Where did she go?

It’s only your preternatural reflexes that save you, a slight overpressure on your cheek the only warning of a blow. You snatch your head back and to the side, the tingle of electricity dancing along your cheek. What in the name of Terra i--

A terrific -- but thankfully non-electric -- blow catches you in the temple, easily enough to render a man unconscious and staggering you despite your resilience. You flow with the impact, flipping back and to the side on one hand before landing in a half-remembered combat stance from your academy days. This time you catch a slight shimmer in the air; lightning quick and barely enough for even your reflexes to catch, it plunges toward your stomach in a disemboweling thrust usually meant to rip the spine from a humanoid foe. You seize the shimmer with your own gloved hands and twist, a play of electricity sheeting from them as Ivanova (who else could it be?) twists free.

You step backward in time to mostly avoid another blow to your head, a faint silhouette of an forearm clipping you as you turn the blow into an evasive spin, bleeding into an enhanced backflip that carries you ten feet to the rear. You skid to a halt and look up to see your XO’s outline sprinting toward you, black edges fading into transparency near the center, solidifying into a normal form even as you watch.

A rapid flurry of blows too fast to normally see, slower than your own but still well into superhuman, heralds her arrival and the recommencement of your fight. You block the first two punches and the knee, striking back with alacrity and landing an elbow to her ribs. She twists away from the blow, spinning, and sets your vision alight once more with a spinning heel to the jaw. You stagger backward, feigning confusion, then drop into a massive sweep that slams into her legs.

And causes you to grunt in pain as her legs don’t move. Too late you realize she has magnetic grapplers on her feet, locking her to the deck. You leap out of the way, tumbling over even as she brings an axe-like heel down where you were and causing a tiny dent in the plating. You jump to your feet again, as she springs after you, trading a blinding series of blows in an instant before forcing her to hop back with a kick of your own.

Instead of charging again she circles slightly, at the ready and dipped in a combat stance. You use the brief respite to analyze as much as you can. The results are, well, less than promising. You were always good in hand to HtH back in the academy, but that was more exercise than actual combat training. You were expected to fly a ship, not actually brawl with foes, after all. Ivanova on the other hand... ugh. Her movements are efficient and brutal, clearly not simply trained -- from the smooth ease that she flows from one into the other it’s likely she has honed them in actual combat as well. Her power is frightening as well, at least a match for your own and able to block even the most forceful of your blows without excessive effort.

On the other side, your reflexes are better. While still blindingly fast and able to react with superhuman speed, she can’t compete with your sheer information processing capabilities. You also may or may not be able to take more punishment, suits like this vary but ones with shield-skins usually tend to rely on the shields themselves to take most of the punishment and have fewer ablative protections. With her shield off like it is she could well be at a disadvantage... and if it’s one of the models with both ablation and shielding you’re not sure what you could do about that anyway.

Finally, you. The stitch in your side is still there from before and your arm tingles. Neither hinder you currently, but she knows about both. They could be weak spots. Second your own abilities; the exertion of operating at your peak with abandon have left you drained, but it’s possible you could -- at the price of a significantly aching and tiring recovery over the next few weeks -- operate at your peak once more. Finally, you’ve managed to maneuver the five remaining drones (as stealthily as possible) into positions just out of sight from the clearing the two of you are fighting in.

>3 EP used
>1 Tiring EP remaining
>MORTAL KOMBAT WAT DO?

>>15786918
drones flood in, do their best to pin her. co-ordinate with us. for fucks sake don't let her out of our sight! this is our only chance. and don;t burn the EP yet.... we can still get this. just keep in HtH and try not to fuck up.

Feint overexertion (leave an opening), then EP to perform a perfectly coordinated attack with all the drones. Play our strengths, basically.

Whichever way it goes, we need to end this now.

First i put this theme song on:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=egne2ZCMM_0

Then i summon the drones. While they are arriving i CHARGE! At this point we have nothing left to do. We BARELY managed to get in close without getting 1HKOed. So lets fight until the drones get here hopefully distracting her so we can use them to pin her down.

>>15786918

Shoot her with lasers from your robotic eye! I mean why even have robotic eyes in the first place?

use the drones as a distraction, then quick draw our side arm (we do have a side arm right?) and mozambique drill our XO.

OPERATOR AS FUCK.

Keep Her in HtH and burn our last EP to do so, hopefully buying us enough time to have the drones pin her in. If she still beats us, then my hat off to her. I wonder what her three questions will be.

>>15786918

Do we have localized grav control within the ship? I mean is our control of it fine enough to just increase gravity for her and keep us unaffected?

>>15786961
Add to that cutting (or increasing) gravity, activating loudspeakers, flaring lights... basically, any trick we can pull to overwhelm her in every way in one instant.

>>15786918

Shit has officially gotten real.

Feint a charge then fucking disengage gravity as we leap into her and finally use that last point to grapple.

>our face the entire time

Do drones have manipulators? If so, pin the XO ourselves and have a drone shoot her in the back with our gun. (Make sure the drone doesn't accidentally shoot us). Also keep playing with the gravity.

If possible (maybe spending an EP) I suggest finding a way to throw her straight up, then upping the gravity to slow her speed to 0 and cut gravity at that point so she's left floating, unable to do anything unless she has thrusters.

>>15787001
hope she has epilepsy :P

wait, magnetic boots, theres gotta be a way we can make use of that. maybe run a really strong current through something nearby, pull her that way?
Reverse the polarity of something? That always works for spock

IDK enough about electro magnatism, maybe someone else does?

>>15787035

they're probably attached to the floors, which are metal. unless we can move those, we can't use that.

can we move those?

>>15787018

She has magnet boots, I think it's only deactivated when she wants to step forward. For zero G combat and whatnot.

>>15787035
We could disengage gravity and leap away straight up while shooting straight down. I doubt she can react fast enough to disengage her boots if we jump with all our might, giving us good distance and getting away from hand to hand combat with a more experienced foe.

>>15787091
her greatest advantage is range. we'd be giving her that. and exposing ourselves. even if we hit, we're not necessarily overpowering. plus she would have the advantage of cover in that scenario.

am I correct in assuming neither of us still has our rifles and no pistols or other ranged weapons?
WOuld it be worth flipping the gravity to the roof and having a drone throw, toss, or carry our rifle to us then capping Ivanova a few times while she unlocks her mag boots to follow us to the roof?

>>15787112
No cover if we jump straight up, for a bit, at least. I'm still not quite sure who the better shot is, but my money is on us, especially with a supercomputer to back us up.

>>15787121
That's my plan, detailed here:
>>15787091

>>15787121
Once again VALUABLE SUPPLIES > friendly lazer-tag match.

>>15787121
she can just shoot us back.

>>15787060

If she engages the boots then she still has to take our flying gravity tackle while magneted to the floor.

If she doesn't then we still get in close enough to finish the job.

>>15787154
valuable supplies wont go anywhere if we just turn the gravity off, instead of reversing it.

>>15787154
Not only that, but think this through you morons. You would be either sending tons of solid metal hurtling toward the roof of the cargo bay or letting it float free to crush us to death. Really fucking smart. Turning gravity off doesn't turn MASS off.

>>15787132
it's not that we're a bad shot. it's that she can hide. and i think we've proven how inept we are at dealing with a hidden foe. using the drones now that i think of it would be pretty futile aswell: she's probably more flexible.

but let's try some shock and awe anyways, flares and everything. hell set off the vacuum alarm, as well as everything else we have access to. then charge and try to turn this into a brawl and not a fight: tackle her and don't let her up. when facing a superior opponent it;s best to keep them off balance. attacking is one way. also going for the head is nice. try to take off that helmet. atleast we'll be able to see a floating head

>>15787180
Turning off gravity doesn't mean boxes will float up. They'll mostly stay where they are unless a force acts on them, which it wont, for most of them.

>>15787184
She can't hide in the short time it takes us to jump up and take aim. Most she can do is shoot us back (if she still has her gun). I propose using the EP to take her gun, then jump up, turn off gravity and shoot in one fluid motion. And lets hope she doesn't manage to grab our foot.

>>15787121
>flipping the gravity to the roof

Not something I agree with because there's still sensitive stuff in this cargo bay. Not worth the bragging rights, she can have her 3 questions (in fact, those are more likely to advance plot or whatever).

Move the drones in, try to pin her.

Flash lights, play various disorienting sounds, vary gravity, feint. Going full operator in close combat while the drones pin her and we're floating up in zero G sounds awesome enough for me.

whichever way this goes, it was well-played by Kat. Can we cal her Kat? If she wins, say something to the extent of "I might not be able to beat the best Intel agent in the galaxy, so that's why I need to rely on you, Katerina."

Are you still waiting for a decision vedibere?

Someone should make a list of the options and we could vote on them.

>>15787207

That's exactly what will happen, she'll grab our fuckin' foot and then rape us.

Just try and tackle/shoulder-charge her.

>>15787236
We need to use our processing abilities to our advantage. Tackling her will just earn us an electrified glove to the jaw.

>>15787236
It's not rape if we want it.

The captain is in charge of keeping morale up. The dickings will continue until morale improves.

>>15787257


Bobbin' and weavin' nigga do you know it?

Fuck, we've given her a pretty good fight and I kinda wanna know what her questions will be.

Take the electronic interference to the next level, blind everything but visual as best we can, strike in conjunction with that, then bring in the drones. Use the EP for that portion of the fight, then do the stupid jump thing if we are on the verge of being knocked out anyway.

>>15787271
I'm almost certain we'll end up losing anyway, its just that I'd rather lose in ranged combat than in close combat (personal preference, and being a part-time spaceship we're more familiar with shooting than close combat, so it fits character).

I detect a few flaws in all this arguing, though. First I bet Ved is already writing, and second, we don't have confirmation on what happened to our guns.

Also, if the room has radar in it, we can use focus that and cause quite a bit of pain and destroy electronics with inadequate shielding. It'd be like putting our XO in a microwave!

>>15787271
I have a sneaking suspicion that this is a suppose-to-lose fight, with the purpose of advancing plot.

>>15787320
But that suit that she has is far too valuable to damage in a simple training exercise.
It's more tricked out than something from Armada Elite Ops, so it's probably as advanced and hard to repair as the Harbinger.

>>15787334
I'm sure the suit is adequately shielded. Unlike her delicious fleshy parts.

I really hate to bring this up but if we turn off gravity stuff is going to continue to move in the last direction it was going, and we are in an orbit right now so it will be moving because of that.

>>15787257
that involves getting to range. but in HtH we have the advantage of negating her stealth, preventing her from using her long range weapons, and we can use our drones that are coming atleast for shock while we beat her ass.

we process how to respond to her attacks while she tries to get away (if she does). besides, i very much doubt she expects us to just charge.

>>15787345
The stuff is stationary relative to the ship, which is in orbit. This means that the stuff has the same speed as the ship, which means if we turn off gravity, the only forces acting on the stuff will be minuscule air currents, which means it wont change its speed by much, which means that it will still be stationary relative to the ship.

Stuff doesn't just float up if you turn of gravity, guys. It doesn't work that way

>>15787383
We're orbiting. What usually keeps you in orbit is gravity pulling you in against momentum trying to sling you away.

If we cancel gravity then the stuff here will start moving in a straight line, including us, and it will effectively look like everything just starts floating. Likely not very fast, but it will leave the ground unless the momentum is towards the ground.

>>15787430
But we don't cancel the planet's gravity, we just turn off our gravity generators, so the stuff will still be in orbit. Sure it will move a bit due to various forces, but not enough to matter for the short time that gravity will be off.

>>15787430

I would imagine having control of gravity means we can compensate to have almost zero momentum on the objects inside.

>>15787430
You Fail So Hard.

Seriously. I mean it. Sooo Fucking Hard. Go tell your science teacher this shit you're spouting. Even money he facepalms.

I know I'm late, but can we ram something gently, then wait in line?

>>15787532
Only if by "something" you mean Katerina and by "ramming" you mean delivering dickings.

>>15787562
Hmm... could work, I bet she doesn't expect that.

>>15787562

Katernya.

Say it with me, Katernya.

>>15787575
Actually its Kateryna.

Although it should be Ekaterina. Kateryna just sounds wrong to me.

>>15787575
>>15787621
We should just call her Katya. maybe Katyusha.

>>15787271

She might not ask them for a while.

Vent her.

>>15787640
Katyusha is either too endearing or too condescending depending on the context. I don't think she'll take it well if she's actually anything like today's Russians

>>15787640
>>15787621
She insisted that we call her Kateryna so that's what we are calling her.
So can we please get back on topic?

>>15787658
what about Kathy?

>>15787658
What topic? We're just waiting for Vedibere to update, and I doubt anything we discuss at this point will change the outcome of this particular skirmish.

>>15787658
Yes, we should get back on topic.

The topic being how to bump her gently and get in her line.

>>15787658

The topic of waiting for Vedibere to post?

>>15787650
I thought i told you to stop posting.
As for our current predicament At this point we are out of options and stuck in. So lets get stuck in, turn this into a brawl, while calling for help from the drones.

Why do people want to vent her? This match is supposed to be a test of skill, not "hurr durr space her we win". The solution's pretty simple - try and keep her distracted with HtH and snipe with the drones. Our body's a lot more resilient to electricity than the drones are.

Also, is Vedi writing? I have to wake up at 8, but I really want to see how this ends...

>>15787679
crew has to sleep
>adviceharbinger.jpeg
cryo freeze

>>15787679

The reason people want to vent her? The only reason I can think of is that they are fucking retards.

>>15787701
I thought it was already an established fact that well over half of the people in any given quest are retards.

vent her- gently.

>>15787750
Ohhh, okay.

Well, there’s no getting away from it now. You move the drones in, charging at the same time to distract Ivanova. Your first two blows are a blur, barely blocked in time, but she soon compensates and matches you once more. Your rain of blows slows and she begins returning with her own, one snaking through your defenses and landing on your still-sore side.

Even as the electrical release drives a grunt from you, though, two of the drones move up behind her and attempt to grapple. She spins, kicking one away and landing a shocking grasp on the other, giving you time to recover from the blow and counterattack. Your blow nearly hits home, a third drone throwing her off balance as she dodges the first drone again before disabling it, dancing backward. You keep up the pressure, though, knowing this is your last chance. the last three drones move in and so do you.

What follows is a furious exchange of blows, Kateryna flowing and weaving through the awkward drones while electrocuting and disabling them; your own shocking fists catching her once in the solar plexus as she eliminates the third. She staggers slightly at the blow before whipping around even faster than before, her rain of attacks blurring with speed equal to your own. High-voltage punches to the jaw, ribs, stomach, ribs again, and a final sweep to your legs sends you crashing down to the deck. Still, you twist away and stand legs straining a bit with the aftereffects of the current that coursed through your body.

But your XO backs off holding up one of her hands, voice ringing monotone and metallic from her helmet, “I think maybe it is time to call the match, da? You are not looking so well.”

>Accept defeat?
>One last gambit?

>>15787781
DO WE LOOK LIKE A FUCKING PUSSY!!!!!!!?!?!?!?!?!!? HELL NO!!!! GO ALL IN!!!!!! ALL OR NOTHING!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Call the match, she wins.

>>15787781

NEVER

Grab her by the arms and then headbutt her in the helmet and hope a fucking miracle happens.

I think that Accepting defeat would not be shamefull in this case.

rolled 25 = 25

>>15787781
She wins, good game.

>>15787781
never give up, never surrender....

unless your opponent is a spec ops trained death killer. then we might want to consider it. we shall be gracious and bow out. besides, it;s just some stupid chocolate. we gave her a run for her money atleast.

"it would appear that you've bested me. what are your questions?"

I think she would respect the commitment to see it through, so long as we aren't making our body unfit for duty.

We're going to lose, but we should still try.

>1 Tiring EP remaining

As much as I hate to bring up an old meme, I think it's time for one final gambit. Video related.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FFtw7qW7Vcw

Lesson to be learned: just because we're a warship doesn't mean we can beat a purposely trained, equipped and experienced Intel operative at her own game.

We're military. We're trained not to give up.

That being said, I have no idea what we'll do to continue.

Briefly kick the gravity up to 10Gsto knock her down, then get back in it.
>buffers ityMostr
And load some monsters into the buffer.

Does it actually matter if we're sore for a few weeks? We're going to be sitting here waiting on repairs regardless, we might as well give it our all. How do we turn down her offer without seeming like a dick? Face punches are generally considered a rude response to a white flag.

Do we have anything left to ram her gently -with-?

Call the match, it was in good fun. Besides, taking on a highly-trained (the best) assassin was foolhardy from the start. Processing power and brute force can't compensate for raw cunning and cold, hard experience. We can only continue to trust her judgment to use her abilities for the better.

Also, I want to set up some sort of practical joke on her when she's going back to her quarters. A bucket of water poised precariously over a slightly ajar door (i know we don't have doors like that), or a malfunctioning food dispenser that sprays her in the face or something. Maybe just drop her quarters to zero gravity when she walks in. Nothing dangerous, but something that lets her know we're still in charge of the big floating hunk of death.

>>15787904
Then she shouldn't have underestimated us.

>>15787904
>>15787842
You just used that. You're pretty much on your last legs here, in case that wasn't painfully obvious already.

>>15787846
I think we are also trained not to pick fights we can't win.

Were going out with a bang. Why the hell would we surrender?

>>15787781
>landing a shocking grasp on the other

I thought this was a sci-fi quest.

It's a loss. Anon thought they could beat the elite operative by being retarded and charging without planning (or planning stupid shit) and failed.

Just call it. Should've played your strengths, not try to look cool which just ended up making the cap look dumb and desperate.

DETONATE THE CLUSTER EATER FUCK EVERYTHING

>>15787924
then, i guess we'll have to swallow our pride and accept defeat. we obviously need more practice and time to recover to our peak fitness.
>we'll meet again, Captain planet!.jpeg

>>15787955
So we dont piss her off???

>>15787944

It's a little late for that isn't it?

Come on, one last punch of the falcon variety to prove that we dont quit no matter what even if the situation is hopeless.

>>15787920
Is she an assassin? I thought she was just a space commando or whatever.

Accept defeat. Tell her we want a rematch after we've gotten some training in. Her three questions are going to be much more interesting than a bar of chocolate anyhow.

Fine, fine. But let's do something smarter than a falcon punch.

Punch up the gravity to a ridiculous level just before we try it like someone else suggested to throw her off.

>>15787988
Oh please, we were always going to give them to her either way.

>>15787781

"You can forfeit if you want."

THEN try our last gambit when she comes at us.

Im all for admitting defeat. Im sure that she would do the same if we challenged her to a duel with SPACE SHIPS.

We can't beat her physically, obviously that's clear. She's taken every trick we've got in the entire electromagnetic and gravitic spectrum and flipped it back on us.

But what's not clear is whether her emotional and psychological state can be exploited. We've got the most powerful data processor in the world, and recordings of every conversation and action for the past few months. Is there anything we can say or throw at her to throw her off and give us an opening?

>>15788010
"As your Captain, I order you to tell me what you were doing in the command room on Orson."
Wait until she spazzes, then give her electric hugs.

>>15788010

We still have to work with her though. We dont need to fuck up our relationship with her just to win a chocolate bar.

>>15788010
Seriously, anon? Really? You want to inflict emotional trauma on our XO to win a "for fun" game of laser tag?

Yeah, I'm pretty sure we could find something to say just like we could crush her to paste with gravity as soon as we're in another room. Why in the holy name of fuck would we?

>>15788017

WE'RE NOT EXPLODING IVANOVA'S HEAD OVER THIS

GET OUT

>>15788017
That's probably the worst fucking suggestion I've heard. A great idea, if we want to destroy all the trust we've built up with her. You dumb niggers, that isn't like "oh aha ha you pick your nose" type weakness, that is a serious problem that she struggles with. Using that to win a fucking game of laser tag is retarded.

Accept defeat, tell her that next time we should have a spaceship battle.

I guess a dramatic attempt to FALCON PUNCH might be cool, but it's mostly an attempt to lose with flair. There's no way we can win this.

>>15787997
"For the record, if you had been a cruiser and this had been a space battle I would have won. "

>>15788025
>>15788027
>>15788029
>>15788031
Look at all these casual babbys that prefer friendship and emotional health to WINNING AT LASER TAG.
You gotta WIN AT LASER TAG.

>>15788045

0/10 if a troll.

If not then I salute your sarcasm good sir.

okay guys
great plan
fake losing, then while we're talking in the cargo bay use a drone to plant a bomb in her room
that way we win and nobody will ever know of our secret shame of losing at a game of laser tag to a spec ops assassin

>>15788017
I hate this idea forever, just give up.

>>15788058
>>15788045

I love both of you.

>>15788042
Lose with some grace you ball-less fool. Face it, we got our shit wrecked by our junior officer and we should just be gracious in defeat.

Maybe we could just bump her emotional trauma gently?

First, we tie Parsons to the cluster-eater.
Then, we put it in Ivanova's room.
Then we vent the room, bump it gently towards the planet, let it go off, and glass what's left of the planet.

one last glorious charge. nothing we expect to win from but enough to show we don't give up easily.

shout FOR THE EMPIRE or something. that might be good.

>>15787989
>>15788038
Alright, so we try to lose with some flair?
We can use the gravity trick, by punching it up to 2G, then down to 0.5G, and flickering it at different levels to try to throw her off as we try a Falcon Punch!
Yeah, losing is a foregone conclusion at this point, but I think we should go down swinging.

Then finish off with >>15788042 when we're on the ground.

>>15788045

>>15788110
What if saying something like that triggers her BLOODY RAGE berserk mode?

>>15788093

Jesus. I was just talking about an option here. Psychological warfare doesn't mean mindraping her or turning her into a blubbering mess.

I meant more along the likes of taking on a defensive stance, giving a little "bring it on" handwave, and seeing what we could do subliminally or in conversation that could distract her to potentially degrade her fighting abilities and create an opening.

we should stagger to our feet and back off the drones, then, while swaying uncertainly give the "bring it on" handwave (as another anon said) then let her charge. Burn our last chance to giver her one good, solid falcon punch and lets end this.

>>15788097

How about screaming: "RAMMING SPEED" and bumping her gently with a drone?

Jesus fucking Christ, people. Just admit defeat, tell her "good show", answer her questions and be on our way.

Also plan that practical joke as a revenge. It's the perfect comeback.

>>15788131
Lose At Lazer Tag
adviceHarbinger.png
Play Practical Jokes

Guess who's autosaging.

You got another thread in you, Vedibere?

>>15788135
Joke, singular. No need to run that shit into the ground.

redirect her computer terminal to meatspin next time she tries to log on

>>15788192
I have a feeling that it might escalate.

Yeah, one would be fine.

Admit defeat so that we can get over this.

In all honesty, a practical joke is a bad idea. A bit of relaxation with our subordinates is fine, but we are still the superior office. Stupid shenanigans are a bad idea, no matter how close our relationship with her may be.

>>15788265
well, alright, maybe you have a good point. Although we have been playing the commander as a guy with a sense of humor.

rip vedibere
8/03/11 never 4get

Boy I'm sad I came in late.

What I would've done is bunkered up and had the drones reconstruct the battlefield, walling her in. Then I'd have them shrink the walls so that she couldn't escape. Then drone rush kekeke.

If only...

>>15788042
I second this.

>>15788362
that was a good idea

>.<

Archived.

Here's hoping Vedibere comes back

And THIS is why I said I didn't like the laser-tag game.

Look how much time (real time) we wasted, we could have had a shit-ton progress otherwise.

You nod, holding up your hands and slowly sinking to a sitting position on the deck and breathing heavily. “Yeah, that’s it for me. For the record, I would have won if you were a spaceship.” A metallic cough emanates from your XO’s helmet as she reaches back and unhooks it, trailing into laughter as she removes the gear and shakes her hair free.

“Oh, I have no doubt.” she says, walking over and offering you her hand, “I know my limits. I would never want to try fighting you as the Harbinger.”

You frown in mock seriousness while looking at her hand, “I know my limits too, and I passed them a little while ago. I’m afraid I need a shoulder more than a hand.”

Your comment draws a chuckle from your second and she nods, hooking the helmet to her belt and bending over, easily lifting you to your feet. You throw an arm across her shoulders and she walks you over to a slab of metal the right height for sitting, letting you down easily before taking a seat herself.

“You’re stronger than you look.” you comment, looking over and watching her delicately unplug the leads from her implants, and she glances back with a smile.

“The suit helps. You are not bad yourself, considering.”

You narrow your eyes a bit, jokingly. “Oh, considering is it? Well, I suppose I can’t argue. So, what are these questions?”

She tilts her head and purses her lips while removing her gloves, apparently considering. Eventually she shrugs and gives you a wicked smile, “I will ask at later time, I think. Is not every day one gets complete and honest answers. I need to consider.”

You grimace. Great. “Well, I suppose I said that was okay. Now all that’s left is getting out of here. You seized the door bolts, you know.”

She nods and shrugs, “Only so many drones I could handle easily without inflicting permanent damage. I told Dai, though, to keep him from fixing them as soon as the system failed and repair the doors and to let us out. They should be open by now.” She stands, “Do you need me to help you?”

You heave a sigh, finally glad to be able to do one in reality rather than simply through vox speaker. “I should be able to manage now, I would rather not have the men watching as you half carry me around.”

She grins at your comment, “Yes, I guess so. It would be fun, though.”

“Fun.” you say flatly, looking at her.

She stares back for a second before blinking rapidly, “I, no, I meant that it would be fine. I misspoke.”

You roll your shoulders, eyes going to the ceiling far above, “Oh, I don’t know. It sounded like you said fun to me and meant it.”

She turns away, quickly collecting the two rifles she brought, “Y-You are putting words in my mouth, Ged. I am leaving now, you should try not to push yourself and probably go see Dr. Burr just in case.”

You watch through optical sensors as she leaves the bay before slipping back and laying flat on the slab of metal with a smile. Ah, that was fun... even if you’re going to need a few drones to carry this now inert form back to your cabin.

>Wow I’m tired
>Next thread will be Ketro and timeskip
>Say if you want to do anything specific
>Next thread Wed @ 18:00

>>15788558

Hey, there was plot progression..somewhere...and we just argued for most of the thread about irrelevant shit...and we lost anyway...

fuck who am I kidding...

>>15788558
Baw. You had to sit and read while occasionally typing two to three sentences at most. Woe is you.

I personally like writing 'sidequests', character development, and breaks from the plot sometimes during downtime. And I found this to be a good opportunity with people wanting to play the laser tag games.

So basically, pic related. One and a half to two threads of downtime interlude is absolutely fine in my book.

Is that love swimming in the air? God I hope not, not because it wouldn't be glorious, but because most of the questers here would ruin it by being idiots and creepy fucks.

>>15788625

>>15788575
hey, we have relationship +1 with Ivanova

considering she could probably kill us somehow i think that's a good thing. also crew loyalty.

and besides, what would we have done anyways except argue about irrelevant info like how bumping a starship that;s been in orbit for 64k years is perfectly reasonable or how parsons clearly made the aliens not like us. despite being in cryo.

>>15788558
Dude, this isn't just "Go places and do things" quest.

We are playing as people, and people have social situations. We aren't just the ship, we are the captain of a crew, and we have suffered the loss of our empire, our people, and our very history.

Having social events like this one is great, and I liked it very much.

>I would have won if you were a spaceship.

>>15788655

We need drawfaggotry of Ivanova as a ship while the Harbinger gently bumps her.

>>15788643

>vedibere fosters a growing bond of love between us and Ivanova
>he goes full asshole and makes us choose between her and the species
>we watch as she takes her last breath, and dies in the void of space

>>15788680

>>15788704
Fuck that. We've already got genetic samples for all the humans on board.

We're taking Ivanova to a pleasure planet and kicking it for the rest of our lives.

>>15788722

We might as well ask Ivanova to teach us how to fight at some point, since we don't have to build muscle memory and can resim through shit it ought to go fast.

>>15788574
>Say if you want to do anything specific

Well, she called us Ged, so I think we got what we wanted out of this anyway.
And lets run a thorough analysis of her actions and equipment. She's given us a free training session on how to deal with an excellent infiltrator. We should make something of it.

>told Dai, though, to keep him from fixing them as soon as the system failed

Remind Dai, that if he ever does something like this again he's getting replaced by Ketro on the spot. And make him do something unpleasant, like having to listen to one of Ketro's scientist on how awesome their boss is.
That fucker. He definitely gets removed from the bro list.

>>15790032
We're replacing one of our most trusted personnel because he kinda helped out one of our subordinates in a game of laser tag?
what is it with people getting super worked up over this

>>15790955
No idea. Betting they don't play Dwarf Fortress.

>>15790955
After processing:
>Remind Dai, that if he ever does something like this again he's getting replaced

you turn it into something like this:
>We're replacing one of our most trusted personnel

You don't have to read a lot at your job, don't you? Maybe I should add something like the Elcor do in Mass Effect?

[Voicing our displeasure. Jokingly threatening.]

>>15788568
God, /tg/ was so terribly beta this thread.