Oktyabar |
Oh, I hadn't noticed the edit on the carapace armor. In that case, I'd recommend that Yuriy and Iovanna grab them. Mainly because she's our only close combat character. And keeping the medic alive is a good call (and they're the ranking soldiers.)
And taking the Sentinel is fine by me. (Though that's not our call. We have a squad leader and Commissar for a reason.) ;)
Urias Velmen |
My idea for the walker is to stay far behind you or way ahead. Then the group isn't at risk of discovery. I know the splitting up the party thing is bad, but the speed on a sentinel is ridiculously high when at full power.
Yuriy Piotrson |
Do we have to pick 1 type of terrain for the whole trip? Or could we, say, go along a route that lets us travel through grasslands up to the front, then into the forest from there to the General's coordinates?
DM Morvius |
As a general rule, you'll be able to choose daily what sort of terrain you intend to progress through. The suspected location of the General is primarily mountainous however, so you may have to travel through mountains toward the end.
On the note of traveling over the grassland to the front lines, that's possible, but both sides do have Valkyries that perform recon trips and other methods of spotting enemy troop movements. So it depends on how likely you think they are to notice a single squad moving alone toward the front lines.
Yuriy Piotrson |
The Operator has an untrained Stealth TN of 21 - in forested terrain, that'd be a 41.
If the enemy has active aerial surveillance and we know two squads have failed at this already, taking the entire route by forest and hoping for the best might be good.
I suppose it depends on rations. We have 6 weeks worth of rations each, how long will it take to reach our objective if we travel the full route in forest-mountain terrain? EDIT: Looks like we'll move at 40km/day in open terrain at the speed of the slowest person, or 20km/day in bad terrain. So about a 10-day journey one-way.
Also, is there any chance our Requisition could be used to acquire some form of camo-netting, or just forest-color paints to better conceal a stationary Sentinel? It seems like a fairly obvious thing militaries would have, but is absent from the Wargear lists in the book.
Trying to get a Chimera through the forest and mountains just seems like a terrible idea. But it'll vastly increase our speed, we'd cover most of the distance in a single day. And oddly, it's no less stealthy than a Sentinel would be, they're both listed as Enormous (-20).
DM Morvius |
I don't actually own Shield of Humanity, so let's stay away from wargear from that particular book. I do assume that the paintjob is a "normal" camo-like color however that is included in the existing stealth modifier (a bright pink Chimera would stand out quite a bit).
As for stealth, yes, they test the same, but will as noted have different difficulties in traversing terrain. The Sentinel allows you to make use of forests and mountains more readily which gives you bonuses to remain hidden compared to the open grassland where the Chimera would be more at home. So while the modifiers for vehicle are the same, they are functionally different in how you are likely to travel.
Yuriy Piotrson |
THe camo-netting came in Shield of the Emperor, me thinks.
Weirdly, it doesn't. Two different Regiments start with a vehicle that has attached camo-netting...but SotE doesn't actually have any rules for what camo netting does. EDIT - found it in Shield of Humanity though. -30 penalty on attempts to spot a stationary vehicle with the netting deployed. Meh.
Also, I want a bright pink Chimera now.
I made a mistake about size though - Chimera is Massive, so it'll be -30 instead of -20.
But riding in it means our top speed is limited by the Sentinel at 45kph, rather than the foot speed of 4kph. Even using the forest for cover the entire way at half speed, that means we can reach the target in less than 10 hours - towards the end, we can just ditch the Chimera and hike through the mountains on foot. It'll also give us a convenient evac point to hasten our return to friendly territory, and make it easier to transport rescued friendlies or captives.
Overall, I think advantage still stands to bring the Chimera, if we have someone who can drive it.
..which...we don't. Unless we're leaving the Sentinel behind, we only have one person trained in Operate (Surface). It's a Specialist Skill, so you can't even make an attempt without training.
So, Sentinel for fire support close to the objective, or Chimera for fast transport to/from the objective? My preference between the two is the Sentinel - our food supply will last us the slow route, and it'll slightly increase our chances of remaining hidden. Unless there's a way to get both that I can't see.
Urias Velmen |
I have operate surface.I say we take just the Chimera. Armor on everyone seems the superior option here. If we get tangled up in it, the sentinel would help. This is true. BUT if we have the chimera, we shouldn't get tangled up in anything. We can just floor it out of there.
Oktyabar |
And I wasn't looking forward to walking back 200km with a prisoner. 10-20km to our transport then rolling back as fast as possible? That sounds better.
DM Morvius |
It will vary from time to time, but I'll say that it is likely that you'll move more like quarter speed in a Chimera through the forest - potentially slower. The reason being that unless you are willing to run over trees, you'll have to double back and loop around much more often to find paths the Chimera can take.
You can move more quickly if you like, but doing so will cause much more visible disturbance to the forest.
Yuriy Piotrson |
That would bring us down to about 17kph overland speed, a little bit more than 4x walking speed. Still much faster, but it's not the in-and-out lightning rush of a true mechanized attack.
I think an important factor, and one we simply can't determine, is the frequency/likelihood of encountering enemy patrols. If the rapid-response of a Chimera - 1-2 days in transit instead of 5 each way - outweighs the reduced odds of succesfully avoiding detection (Urias rolling against TN20 for a Sentinel or TN10 for a Chimera, after untrained penalty/forest bonus/size modifier.
And let's not forget the mountains at the end, which will be basically impassible for the transport. If we have to, we can hijack enemy transport for our return journey and leave the Sentinel behind, but for the outgoing leg the Sentinel's tiny bonus to Stealth might make the difference, and aid us in possibly killing enemies who stumble upon us before they can run and report.
Taking a prisoner might just prove to be impractical, with the logistics we have at hand.
Yuriy Piotrson |
It is a warfront, so they won't automatically be looking for you. I will say though, it is your call. There are benefits to each and penalties to each. I'll tell you that the mission isn't an autofail or autosuceed either way based solely on the choice of Chimera or no Chimera.
I was editing pretty heavily during that, with more in-depth thoughts. Of particular concern is the mountainous terrain and what that'll do for Chimera speed.
Now I'm regretting the lack of that camo netting. Effective +30 Stealth is a much bigger bonus when your base check is so low.
Oktyabar |
Urias isn't making a stealth check with either vehicle. The advantage of the Chimera is when he fails one we can bug out faster than trying to run. Neither are getting away from a Valkyrie. And if we get caught on the way back we can try to hit open ground and escape, or ditch the Chimera and try to hide in the woods.
If we take the Chimera it's possible to bring back a captive (though still difficult.) Without it, we're not coming back with anyone alive. And even wounded might get left behind.
Your call, boss. :)
Yuriy Piotrson |
I'm squad leader INO, remember. It wasn't a job I wanted IC or OOC to begin with, so this sort of thing is fine as a group OOC decision.
As for transport, if we need it for the return we can probably commandeer something from the enemy. Urias can get a new Sentinel.
Iovanna |
Nah, don't make it bright pink. Use pink camo instead. :)
I do like the idea of having a vehicle to haul the captive back in. I doubt he would be cooperative and walk along with us.
Yuriy Piotrson |
That's at least 3 people in favor of the Chimera, so Chimera it is then.
Any chance that unused Logistics test could get us some extra ammo for the heavy bolter? Else I suppose we can attempt to get us a single Firebomb Grenade.
...Bolt Shells are Rare. So nope, not for us. Logistics to get a single grenade, then.
TN10: 1d100 ⇒ 27
Nopes.
Does it at least have hull-mounted lasguns? Or are they also missing/damaged?
Yuriy Piotrson |
So we're just going balls-out and not even trying to be stealthy, Grasslands seems like the best terrain option for Day 1. Get us right up into the foothills/mountains and proceed from there.
Iovanna |
Yeah, sounds like balls-out to me. Everyone aboard and we will hopefully reach out target before we can be spotted. :)
So who would be the best to handle the navigation rolls?
Yuriy Piotrson |
Isn't Urias the only one even trained in the skill? He's driving anyways.
As for not being spotted - in the Chimera, he's got a negative Target Number for his Stealth roll. So if literally anyone is watching, we will be seen. Our chance is to outrun whoever is in position to intercept us, then lose them in the mountains during our final leg.
Oktyabar |
I've got navigate as well. If Oktyabar co-pilots he might be able to give Assistance on the Navigation (Surface) roll, and maybe even the Stealth roll. (This seems like one of the few times assistance may actually be viable on that particular skill.)
Yuriy Piotrson |
Hrm. That is an option, and makes Forest potentially viable again; with 2 Stealth assists, if they're permitted, that would race Urias's native check to TN10. In the forest, it'd be up to TN30. That might make the more cautious forest route worth considering.
...on the other hand, it'd reduce the Navigate check from Grasslands TN75 to TN45, even with assists, and slow us down. Okytabar assisting the Navigate Surface, and one other person also assisting Stealth, means almost guaranteed success crossing grasslands and a tiny but non-zero chance of not being seen. We should stick with Grasslands, really.
Yuriy Piotrson |
I take it back. Daaaaaaaamn.
That's enough to get us the entire distance in one day across grasslands - 70kph will in fact get us across most of enemy territory in a few hours...so [entire distance-Mountain minimum] kilometers traveled? Do we need to roll a separate Navigation check for the Mountainous leg?
Urias Velmen |
Moving to discussion on this, if we go full speed through the forest, the Valks will have to fire through the canopy. If we hit the mountains, they will have just as dangerous of terrain considering they are using skimmer-type flight methods to function as gunships. If they were Marauder-Bombers, it would be a crapshoot, but we are talking heavy bolters, a few missiles, and a couple of lascannons here. Plus, they have our chance at shooting vs. my much higher chance of evasion. That being said, we could all die at once.
Yuriy Piotrson |
@DM: I think we have some confusion on what 'full speed' means. Using the Chimera's top cruise of 70kph at max speed, what are you considering to be 'full speed' versus 'half speed' in Grasslands, Mountains, and/or Forest? As the discussion's gone, the Stealth modifiers in all 3 zones are irrelevant since it is impossible for Urias to pass a Stealth check while driving, so Grasslands offered the highest traverse speed at no effective downside. But if moving slow to avoid patrols and Valkyries means we're effectively slower than a Forest route where we'd have the trees blocking aerial surveillance, that would change our thinking.
DM Morvius |
I'm considering you attempting to drive 70kph full speed. In forests that will mean 35kph (or less) in practice. The Stealth test I see as your attempt to evade forces that are either looking for you or otherwise actively monitoring. But if you drive slowly (how slowly depends on what you encounter that day) I'm assuming you attempt to move out of the area when large Dominate forces are noticed, attempt to change directions if you see a Valk fly over that might radio in your heading, etc. A straight rush will let you outpace most pursuit but is guaranteed to mean that the enemy will know the path you are taking and roughly when you'll reach the General's location which means they will be able to respond however they want.
DM Morvius |
Since debate has stopped, I'm going to more forward like this:
If I don't see a firm answer to travel plans some time today, I'll assume that you are going with the initial suggestion of driving full speed from the front lines to the location on your map and barreling past/through any Dominate forces you see.
Aphesius Cort |
If I don't see a firm answer to travel plans some time today, I'll assume that you are going with the initial suggestion of driving full speed from the front lines to the location on your map and barreling past/through any Dominate forces you see.
I think that's a really bad idea and we should not do that.
I would suggest that the closest reasonable alternative to that is going the same direction but attempting to be reasonably stealthy.
Iovanna |
I am putting forth my vote for this option:
But if you drive slowly (how slowly depends on what you encounter that day) I'm assuming you attempt to move out of the area when large Dominate forces are noticed, attempt to change directions if you see a Valk fly over that might radio in your heading, etc.
DM Morvius |
Since disguise is being discussed, I wanted to note something here. You might be aware of this, but if not, your characters certainly are - the Imperial Guard (and as far as you know, the Severan Dominate) has no especially sophisticated method of identifying friend from foe. There aren't generally passive IDs broadcast from simple trucks or anything like that. That said, you are certainly likely to need call signs or pass codes to enter into a base or make close contact with anyone.
On the flip side, even the Dominate live in the grim darkness of a future in which there is only war. So the fact that they don't recognize a given person personally isn't necessarily an auto-loss of credibility if you know the proper codes and clearances. People die and get replaced often enough. Navigating a code system and not slipping up in what you say or do will be more of your risk than actual appearance (at least once you get to the conversation stage).
Yuriy Piotrson |
I'm more aware of the fact that none of us have Deceive trained, and I assumed that bluffing our way past enemies would involve the Deceive skill to act like people who are supposed to know the codes, rather than spies with stolen codes.
DM Morvius |
I'm more aware of the fact that none of us have Deceive trained, and I assumed that bluffing our way past enemies would involve the Deceive skill to act like people who are supposed to know the codes, rather than spies with stolen codes.
For face to face interactions, yes. But if you are looking to just drive around (outside of going through checkpoints and the like) any codes are probably automated. So talking your way through guards will take a Deceive test, but wandering around in Dominate uniforms is unlikely to register on a Valkyrie sweep for example. The downside, of course, is that it requires acquiring said uniforms/vehicles.