
Dawn Svenssen |

I'm good! Thanks!
If it would help you, you could have them as tabs on the same google file.

Dawn Svenssen |

By late and overdue, I think that LAV left with us, which means they're around a month or two overdue.

Daniel Rainwater |

Jacob is the only member of the squad fully trained on Heavy Wheeled Vehicles. Skills of the squad with regards to driving :
Jacob : 13-
Daniel : 11-
Everyone Else : 7-Spending some time driving around at 7- in the wilderness would be excuses to put 1 point into it next time you get exp.
I show that Daniel has two points in this skill and therefore has a skill of 13 and not 11.

mdt |

Daniel has Drive (Wheeled) which is also known as Drive (Automobile). Drive (Heavy Wheeled) is a separate skill that defaults to Drive (Wheeled/Automobile) -2. Driving a Semi-Truck is slightly different than driving a car. But they're close. So if he's in a HUMVEE he has a 13-, but in the LAV he has a 11-.

mdt |

From the discussion, it seems to be a tie between 'Go now and come back later' and 'go now and just talk or run', is that about it? If so, then the squad leader would be the tie breaker.

mdt |

FYI to all my games :
I live in Texas (Austin), and one of the options Harvey has is to wander up and over Austin and laze around and drop a couple of feet of water on us. So if I don't post this week it's because we lost power, internet, or both. Should be fine for anything else, we live on a hill so if we have water flooding our living room, the entire Mississippi river valley is under 80 ft of water from New Orleans to St. Louis. :) So we'd have a lot more problems than flooding at that point.

mdt |

Giving time for everyone else to ask questions/etc. Not really much of a choice other than to commission a bridge, those 35K ton trucks aren't going to make it over on a wooden bridge designed to hold at most 10 5 ton wagons.

mdt |

Wet and rainy. Houston is getting inundated, they're going to get over 3 feet of water this weekend, plus all the runoff from northwest of them. Glad I live in the hills, on top of a hill.

Dawn Svenssen |

How long of a bridge do we need to make?
This is possibly a very long project. If they knew we had a major river, why didn't they send some pontoon bridging equipment?
If we want something to just get us across, we'd be better off with building some really big barges and floating the vehicles over. The LAV has an amphibious capacity and could go first, then use a winch to haul the barges.
Building a semi-permanent bridge we'd need to know the annual flood height, to make sure the bridge was high enough to not get ripped out. The depth of the river, and the width of the bridge to determine the needed supporting materials.
Are we building an arch for river traffic? How high is the majority of the traffic? What is the soil consistency to know how deep the pilings need to be sunk? Do we have access to heavy equipment to quarry rock and move material, and to drive the pilings into the river bed?
A suspension or cable-stayed bridge is probably way beyond our current needs and capabilities but would have minimal impact to existing river traffic.
A beam bridge is the simplest, but won't support the weight of the trucks over any appreciable span.
A truss bridge might be the simplest but would require a lot of wood or steel. Depending on the span, we'd also need to do it in sections with pilings.
Most low tech bridges (roman) are arch bridges, but these can require a lot of pilings and use a lot of heavy rock.
Or a couple of mages with stone to earth, shape earth, earth to stone. that'd take a couple of hours.

mdt |

1) Calia said the river is a mile across
2) You arent' sure why they didn't
3) That's also an option, Dawn can suggest it certainly.
4) All good questions
5) More good questions
6) A good summation of all the different types of bridges
7) I you can find some wizards (mages would be unable to help, they can't use anything other than combat spells).

mdt |

Since it has come up :
A metal barge (the kind they use on the Mississippi) are 195ftx80ftx10ft with a double hull. They can haul 1500 tons per barge. Meaning all your vehicles could fit on one barge. You have no big metal barges of course, but that's to give an idea of what is possible.
The Egyptians regularly hauled 40 and 50 tons of stone down the nile on double hulled barges (different kind of double hull of course), two ships with a wooden raft between them. They also hauled 70 and 80 ton monoliths the same way.
As far as bridges go, there are many options for bridges, although they will take time to build. One suggestion by the GM is you may need to talk to the locals, I suspect there is (both IC and OOC) some underestimation of what the locals can do with their own technology. The pyramids did get built without cranes and helicopters after all. :)

Dawn Svenssen |

Im at a conference the rest of the week and am not in front of a pc as often.

mdt |

Time for OOC Voting, with the Squad Leader giving the orders IC in the thread.
1) Turn around and leave the city
2) Drive up to the city gates, blow up something with a cannon fire, then exit.
3) Drive up to the city gates, park the LAV with the wagoneer, and enter the city in National Guard Uniform.
4) Change uniforms to the local stuff, leave LAV parked here, and walk up on foot.
5) Drive up to the city gates, park the LAV with the wagoneer, and enter the city in local attire.

"Genie" Debbs |

Aren't we trying to make allies here? If so, then I vote for 3, as otherwise we're presenting ourselves falsely. Unless we WANT to present ourselves falsely, that is.

Dawn Svenssen |

My suggestion was more 3 than 2. Not to drive up to the gates. but to drive to just outside bow range (about 150 yards). Park the vehicles, get the attention of the townsfolk. And then shoot a target to demonstrate not to mess with us.

Daniel Rainwater |

Hey all. I am back from my work trip and con. Pretty exhausted (very little sleep at cons for me) and catching up on everything. I hope to have a post up soon. I have a short trip this weekend too and will be gone Friday through Sunday afternoon. But then that's it for trips for a while. Thanks for putting up with my absence.

mdt |

That's ok, they spread enough blood around that most humans would assume they were dead. They may be part human, but they're part something else, and that something else is apparently very hard to kill.

Dawn Svenssen |

I have a feeling that some of us may not understand what it takes to make a bridge.
Assuming that we are still talking about a mile wide river, here's a couple of real world examples:
San Francisco's Golden Gate bridge: 35$ million in 1933, completed in 1937. 1.7 mile length.
Rockville Bridge, longest stone arch bridge. Completed in 1902, 3820 ft long. 2 years to complete.
Morgan G. Bulkeley Bridge: $3 million built from 1903 to 1908, 1075 ft long.
Now while these bridges are designed to carry more weight than we need, they also used thousands of workers and relatively modern heavy equipment.
Without enslaving the local population, we might get a couple dozen workers using primitive tools.
So unless there's a magical McGuffin around the corner, there's zero realistic way to expect a bridge to be a timely solution.

mdt |

Perfectly fine, your characters (other than Dawn) may not realize how much effort bridges take either (including the NPCs). :)
On a different note, Daniel is swamped at work, he'll try to catch up Sunday.

Dawn Svenssen |

Dawn knows, combat engineering includes bridging, though generally of a much smaller scope.

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Jacob has raging xenophobia so he does not yet trust Calia or any other natives. The only things he is listening for and to are to exploit enemy weakness and watch for betrayal. He expressed nothing when Calia died. Good theow another on the bbq. As far as building a bridge I do know also what it takes and it is a massive undertaking. Jacob is not adverse to the what ever it takes method so using these locals resources and technology: no problemo.

Daniel Rainwater |

Hi all. I am done traveling for a time and have finally caught up (73 post!). I'll jump in in a moment. Glad Calia is not dead. Had I been around Daniel might have tried to help her, or at least asked Brenna about helping.
I am a little confused about why the two women fought. They are opposed factions? What do we actually know.