It's very... explosive... and the ED seems to be promising lesbian lolis at some point, but.... there doesn't seem to be any real story here, beyond vague stereotypical rebel aginst the evil corporation stuff. The frame rate is low, and it literally puts up a bllboard to announce each attack. What I'm asking here is, is the show really as aptly named as it seems, or does it at some point turn into something more than popcorn for your eyes? Because seriously, I'd rather rewatch the Kamina episodes of Gurren Lagann three times than 24 episodes like Needless #1.

- CD

ETA: Looked it up and discovered that the Wikipedia articles is unusually detailed... ...basically, the impression I get is someone was sitting around the studio one days, trying to think up idea for a new manga, and happened to see an issue of Wolverine sitting beside one of the Naruto tankobon with Sasuke on the cover. "Yes! We can make loads of loot off of this!" he shouted in glee, before scribbling some character designs with thick, jaggy lines and skipping off to the Chief Editor's office to present The Next Big Thing. This is probably unfair of me, but with three episodes down and still not caring about the characters at all, indications are uniformly bad. Unless someone tells me that it has a sharp improvement later, this one's a lock for discard.
--
"Anko, what you do in your free time is your own choice. Use it wisely. And if you do not use it wisely, make sure you thoroughly enjoy whatever unwise thing you are doing." - HymnOfRagnorok as Orochimaru at SpaceBattles
woot Med. Eng., verb, 1st & 3rd pers. prsnt. sg. know, knows

I created this to be a minigame in Ninja Robot Space Fighter, but it's perfectly playable IRL. It's meant to have a TCG feel while using standard playing cards and/or a Tarot deck. Do please tell me what you think of it, especially if you actually play it in a group - I've only playtested it solitaire.

• Turn: The period in which a player can choose cards from their hand to Attack other players.
  
• Round: The period in which a single Battle is contested, including dealing each player a hand of cards, discarding and replacing any cards in those hands, dealing an ambush card, each player's Turn, any Ambushes during those Turns, and tallying the Battlefield of each player to determine who wins the Battle. All cards are collected and shuffled at the end of each Round.
  
• Battlefield: An area in front of each player where their cards are placed, seperately (not in stacks) and face up, after being played. It is the cards in the Battlefield at the end of a round that determine which player wins the Battle.
  
• Command Post: (Tarot deck only) a central area where Major Arcana are put in play.
  
• Skirmish: the process of deciding the winner between attacking, defending, and any ambushing cards.
  
• Soldiers: the counters used to keep track of progress in the game. Some players may want to call them by other warrior-like names, but they're all the same; Braves, Conscripts, Dogz, Footmen, Grunts, ICPs, Lancers, Mercs, Minions, Ninja, Peons, Rabble, Samurai, Toadies, etc.
  
• Army: Each player's supply of Soldiers.
  
• Sortie: The number of Soldiers put into the Battle or added to a card in a Skirmish by each player.
  
• Battle: A central area holding all the Soldiers Sortied by all players in one round.
  

• Each player will need an Army to play, the more Soldiers the longer the game will last. 100 each is suggested with minimum Sorties of ten, increasing by five each time a player is eliminated. Actual toy soldiers make particulary good Soldiers, but ordinary poker chips are easier to stack. It is suggested that threee types of markers be used, with values of 1, 5, and 10 Soldiers respectively. The larger denominations may be called Squads and Platoons if desired.
  
• Determine turn order before dealing, the person with the last turn deals.
  
• Each player is dealt five cards at the beginning of the round, and may discard up to all five cards and be dealt replacements.
  
• If a Tarot deck is being used, any Major Arcana in the player's hand should be played to the Command Post or discarded and replaced with regular cards before any Skirmishes begin. Each player may only put one Major Arcana in play per round.
  
• Each player Sorties a number of Soldiers, ranging from the minimum to their entire Army, placing them in the Battle. If the player's Army is empty at the beginning of a round, they are out of the game. If their Army does not contain enough Soldiers for the minimum Sortie (due to opponents' Thieves, for example) they must Sortie all their remaining Soldiers.
  
• Each player recieves one more card, left on the table face down, which may be played at any time as an Ambush. The remainder of the deck is placed face up as a discard pile. Players may look at their own Ambush card. If a Major Arcana is recieved as an Ambush card, it must be discarded and replaced with a normal card.
  
• The player whose turn is active may then play a card to Attack any other player, placing it face up on the table. Two cards of the same suite may be played as a single Attack or Defense if desired. The Defender may play any card in Defense, the higher face value winning.
  
  Either player may Sortie any number of additional Soldiers to add to the attack or defense value of the card(s) played, placing them beside the relevant card. The Attacker, Defender, and any Ambushers may take turns Sortieing additional Soldiers as desired to determine the winner of a particular Skirmish. If the player has no more cards in his hand, Soldiers may still be Sortied in this fashion, effectively adding to a card with a value of zero and no Special Ability.
  
  The special effect of whichever card(s) win the Skirmish are applied, then all played cards are placed in their player's Battlefield. Ties go to the defender. Attacks may be allowed to pass unopposed if the defender does not want to play any cards, in which case the attacking card's special ability automatically succeeds. When the Skirmish is decided, all extra Sortied Soldiers are added to the Battle.
  
• Ambush cards disrupt a Skirmish and send any lower-value cards from the attack or defense to the Discard pile. If unused by the end of the round, these ambush cards are added to the owner's Battlefield just like any remaining hand cards. They may be used by either side of a Skirmish, or by any other player at the table on a Skirmish they are not involved in, either in support of (combining face value with) the attacker or defender, or to attack both sides, as chosen by the player using the Ambush card. Regardless of who plays them, ambush cards will always send ALL lower value cards in the Skirmish to the Discard pile.
  
  Ambush cards use their special effect on the owners of all defeated cards, making a high-value thief or wizard exceptionally desirable for ambushes.
  
  
  
• When the active player does not wish to use any more of their hand cards, or all have been played, their turn is over. When all players have had a turn, the player with the strongest Battlefield (highest total value of cards) wins the Battle, and all cards are placed in the discard pile and shuffled. In the event of a tie, split the pot evenly and draw for a high card after shuffling to win any remainder. Major Arcana do not have any face value, and so do not affect the outcome of the Battle directly. Play continues until each player is out of Soldiers in their Army at the beginning of a round, or resigns with the Soldiers currently in their Army.
  

• Diamonds = Coins/Pentacles = Thieves
  
• Hearts = Cups = Healers
  
• Clubs = Wands = Wizards
  
• Spades = Swords = Fighters
  
• Jack = Knight = 11
  
• Queen = 12
  
• King = 13
  
• Ace = 14
  
• Joker = Page = Dragon = 20
  
  Ignore the suite of Dragon cards when using a Tarot deck
  

• Thieves capture their face value of Soldiers from the opponent's Army and add them to the player's Army.
  
• Wizards capture at least one card from the opponent's hand or Battlefield, which is then added to the player's hand. The attacker chooses the captured card, but does not get to see the faces of those cards still in the opponent's hand. (Hand cards must be chosen unseen, with only the backs fanned out.) The total value of captured cards is subtracted from the value of the wizard, and if the result is above zero another card may be captured.
  
• Fighters attack or defend with double their face value, including when they are used to add to another card's value. The other card's value in such a case is not also doubled unless it was also a Fighter, however. They force the defender to discard the lowest card in their Battlefield. Extra Soldiers Sortied to support a Fighter are not doubled. When The Fool is in play, the card discarded from the battlefield is chosen blindly, by the defender (the player who owns that battlefield)
  
• Healers may return any cards with a total face value equal to or less than twice their own from the player's Battlefield to their hand. Extra Soldiers may be Sortied as usual to increase the value of a Healer for this purpose, and are also doubled. Healers may also be used to attack or defend normally but return to the players hand instead of the Battlefield after a Skirmish if the player wins it, and may combine with cards of any suite to increase their value. Healers may not themselves be healed.
  
  
  
• Dragons send any card they defeat to the discard pile rather than the player's Battlefield regardless of whether they are used to attack, defend, or ambush, for you are crunchy and taste good with ketchup. The value of the opposing cards is subtracted from the value of the Dragon and any card(s) riding it, and any cards in the opponent's (and/or ambushers') Battlefield with face values totalling up to the remaining value are also Discarded. Dragons may be ridden by (be played and combine with) a second card of any suite or two cards as long as those two cards are of the same suite, from the same hand, and in such a case the special ability of the riding card(s) is also applied at the end of the Skirmish. They may also be ridden by Healers to increase the number of cards that can be Healed. Dragons played as Ambushes may not be ridden, but can be combined with other cards in the Skirmish like any other Ambush card.
  

• The Fool: All Battlefield cards must be placed face down, and players may not look at the faces once placed. Special Abilities which affect Battlefield cards must be handled like capturing cards from an opponent's hand with a Wizard, subtracting the value of Battlefield cards from the played card after picking each one blindly.
  
• The Magician: Players may place a card from their hand face down on the table as a second Ambush card.
  
• The High Priestess: All Ambush cards must be placed face up on the table.
  
• The Empress: Healers may be Healed, by Sortieing a number of Soldiers equal to their face value.
  
• The Emperor: All cards double their face value when used to Defend. (Warriors use 3x their face value.)
  
• The Hierophant: Any card in the player's hand may be played as a Healer of the same face value, including Dragons.
  
• The Lovers: Cards of any suite may be played together and combine face values. Only one Special Ability is used, chosen by the player.
  
  
  
• The Chariot: Wizards capture double their face value in opponent cards. (counters Strength)
  
• Strength: Wizards capture only half their face value of opponent cards. (counters The Chariot)
  
• The Hermit: The player's Ambush Card may be picked up and added to their regular hand.
  
• Wheel of Fortune: Each player rolls a die for each card played, and adds it to the value of that card. Warriors do not double this die value.
  
  
  
• Justice: All players involved in a Skirmish (Attacker, Defender, any Ambushers) must Sortie the same number of extra Soldiers to their cards. If one player does not have enough Soldiers in their Army, no player can Sortie more than that number of extra Soldiers to the Skirmish.
  
• The Hanged Man: The player's Ambush card may be played as a Healer (regardless of suite, and including Dragons) to return cards from their Battlefield to their hand. The Ambush card is then placed on the Battlefield.
  
• Death: Any card may be played as a Warrior of the same face value, including Dragons.
  
• Temperance: Extra Soldiers Sortied to increase the value of cards count double.
  
• The Devil: Any card may be played as a Thief of the same face value, including Dragons.
  
• The Tower: All cards double their face value when used to Attack. (Warriors use 3x their face value.)
  
• The Star: Thieves capture double their face value of opponent Soldiers. (counters The Sun)
  
• The Moon: Any card may be played as a Wizard of the same face value, including Dragons.
  
• The Sun: Thieves capture only half their face value of opponent Soldiers. (Counters the Star)
  
• Judgement: The minimum Sortie is doubled for this round.
  
• The World: All Ambush cards double their face value. (Warriors use 3x their face value, 4x for the relevant use if The Emperor and/or The Tower are also in play)
  

• Battlefield cards may be counted as in poker (pairs, straights, flushes, etc.) to determine the winner of the pot, instead of by simple face value
  
• Four players may form teams of two with a shared war chest, playing in attack-defense-attacker's team mate-defender's team mate order within the turn and within the round, where the defender's team mate was the dealer, and the attacker's team mate is the dealer next round. Attacker and defener play cards normally, while team mates may play one card to combine with the attacker or defender's cards, and any player may use their ambush card as usual. If the maximum cards were played by a team, up to five cards may combine their face value.
  
  
  
• Two players may control two hands each, as in a four player team game.
  
• If more decks of cards are available, any number of players can take part, but Rounds can get very long. For practical purposes, five or six really is the most players that can be accomodated.
  
• One to three dice may be used, rolled by attacker and defender and added to the value of their played cards. If The Wheel of Fortune is in play, an extra die would be rolled if this optional rule is used.
  
• If "poster decks" with unmistakeably different faces can be obtained (such as Star Wars, Star Trek, Lord of the Rings, and Transformers decks, for example) one deck may be used for each "character class" rather than working in suites. In such a case suites are ignored and only which deck the card belongs to matters. Note that because the back patterns will be different, this makes obvious what type of cards are in a player's hand or set aside as an ambush, though number values will remain unknown to opponents. This may be preferable for novice players or younger children, to make the game easier.
  
• If toy soldiers or poker chips (or a ready expedient such as coins, stones, or polyhedral dice) are not available, each player's Army and Sorties may be tracked on scrap paper.
  
• In a tournament setting, each player may continue to higher brackets with their total Army from lower brackets, but starting Army size may be smaller and minimum Sorties should also increase accordingly to avoid very long games.
  

• If you have sevens or lower in your initial hand, discard them.
  
• Players who are very familiar with the rules may raise the number of Major Arcana that can be put in play in the Command Post each round. Alternately, players might keep seperate comand posts (the Major Arcana in each only in effect when that player is involved in a Skirmish or Ambush) and play up to two or three Major Arcana into their own Command Post each round, assuming they receve that many in the cards they are dealt.
  
• Play Thieves, then Wizards, then Fighters, then Healers - and Fighters only if there's something in the opponent's Battlefield.
  
• Save healers for the end of your turn if there's anything worth healing, even if it means letting some attacks go unopposed.
  
• Sortieing extra Soldiers to increase the value of your cards is effective, but can quickly empty your Army. It's best to only do so when just a few extra Soldiers will win the Skirmish, possibly in combination with an Ambush card, or to when an opponent plays a Dragon.
  
• The use of ambush cards is a bit different depending on the card's value. Because they send all lower value cards to the Discard pile rather than the player's Battlefield, it's best to only use low-value Ambush cards when you are the attacker or defender to combine with your normally played card(s), to avoid weakening your Battlefield. Ambush cards with a high face value are better used to interrupt a contest between two other players, attacking both sides to force them to be Discarded.
  
  
  
• In a game with more than two players, plan to have at least three cards in your hand when you end your turn to defend with. If your ambush card is good you MAY count it as one, but it's better used to break into a contest if possible.
  
• If you run out of hand cards early in the round in a game with more than two players, resign. You lose what's in the Battle, but without cards to defend with you'll be the target of everybody else's Thieves and lose your Army.
  

This is a wiki entry (I will push it to the wiki tomorrow) which will explain some things I want to be out before I post the next story (maybe tomorrow or Sunday). Have fun to read and comment it.
------------------------

Element Zero (Eezo)

»Eezo is the first unique invention made by Catgirl Industries, which shaped the form and function of many products afterwards.«
- From the CI history holo, 2068 edition

»I cannot comment on the creation of Element Zero, its a trade secret, but mixing up Handwavium with hydrogen as a replacement core definitely wasn't a bright idea. Or a very bright one if I look at the video of the explosion.«
- From 'Repairing Handwaved Engines', Mars bulletin board 2017

»Oh, shiny!«
- Catgirl after accidentally producing the first batch of Eezo, December 2015

Element Zero is a strain of Handwavium that follows the story of the Mass Effect universe. In its natural form its a blue glowing liquid substance. Like its role model it reacts to electrical currents, creating zones of changed gravity. As most Handwaved based substances, its detailed mechanism is unknown, but its said that it generates or repels dark energy to influence the basic workings of physics.

Eezo or Mass Effect fields can not only propel objects at high and even superluminal speed, it can also create impact barriers, similar to the particle shields of the Warsies. Element Zero is not used up while creating this fields, but needs a constant input of electrical energy.

Eezo does not replicate as easily as some common handwavium strains and its production seems to be difficult, because Catgirl Industries seems to be always low on their stockpile. It can only be obtained at Catgirl Industries, mostly built into the drones they sell. There has been a request by the Lensmen for a combined research project about the possibility of creating ‘Bionic implants'.

Mass Effect field drive

» Central Mass Effect core deployed, shield up and stable, active defenses fully charged... let us give them a nice welcome present. «
- Cortana, during the second attack of The Tanglewood Boys in 2017

Drive type: reactionless dark energy drive
Drive rating:
1st gen cruising speed 0.1c, sprint speed up to 0.12c
2nd gen cruising speed 0.11c, sprint speed 0.14c
roughly 500c outside the Limit

Element Zero can be used as the core of a reactionless drive system. The so called ‘Mass Effect' wraps the target into a shell of Dark Energy, which moves forward at great speed. When energized by an electrical current an Mass Effect core can manipulate the mass of objects within the drives effect. This effect create a speedy drive, which allows the ship or drone to quickly reach the maximum speed, cutting the electricity drops the ship down to normal speed quickly.

It also can be used to create artificial gravity fields within a limited radius. Increased gravity can be inconvenient to people inside, but mass effect fields have never been observed more than 3g or 4g, which limits the amount of damage it can do. It is assumed that this is a manifestation of the slapstick effect.

The largest first generation Mass Effect drive ever sold by Catgirl Industries, which were developed in winter 2015, is able to only accelerate a body up to a diameter of one meter. The drive can also project a single circular forcefield surface with a diameter of 90 cm, which can protect the interior of the drive field against kinetic damage from one direction.

Unhappy with this, Catgirl Industries continued to focus on a research project to create a better iteration of the drive. In 2017 Catgirl Industries released the first drone with a second generation drive. This new generation not only pushed the maximum field diameter to two meters, it also included the forcefield protection into the drives engine field, allowing a full 360° protection. The protection is still mostly limited to kinetic weapons.

Trivia:

• The energy consumption of the drive peaks quickly when going beyond cruising speed. Most drones built by Catgirl Industries cannot store enough energy for sprint speed for more than a few seconds. Other drones are even limited to lower speeds to conserve energy.
  
• Mass Effect drives always seem to produce a spherical drive field, even if the drone has a different shape.
  
• The forcefields glow bright red when hit by a projectile until they regenerated their strength. They can be overloaded by multiple smaller impacts.
  
• Pure gravity generator Mass Effect cores cannot produce forcefields, but can cover a much larger area than the full space drive.
  

• Funny looking cat! Mass Effect drive fields sometimes produce a static charge during long operations.
  
• Fireworks. Mass Effect drives produce a lot of light when the ship engage its drive at superluminal speeds.
  
• Game Mechanics. The shields of a mass effect field does not begin to recharge until it got some time without further impacts.
  

http://geekout.blogs.cnn.com/2011/09/02 ... hpt=hp_bn8

http://youtu.be/8DMbA3z0630
Someone posted this link in the UStream chat earlier today/
Accurate?  Unknown
Cool?  Eff Yeah!

Just a drabble. I'm not planning on using this as a villain.
---------------------------------------------
The voice that came across Rocky's cellphone was flat and digitally distorted, but there was no mistaking the tone. "I've reviewed the business ventures from the last cycle, Rocky. The profits on the trafficking of modified servants is slipping. You were down 7.632%. This is unacceptable."
Rocky was sweating. Messing with the profits was something that irritated the Boss, and it didn't pay to irritate the Boss. "Yessir. I'm aware of the discrepancy, sir. We believe it was the result of interference by the Banzai Institute in our operations in Haiti. Their disaster relief teams there have been keeping a closer tally of the refugees than we expected.
The voice responded, its tone strangely booming, even out of the small cellphone speaker. "There's a 93.82% chance that you're right. Start looking for other sources. Haiti is no longer a profitable source of income in that market."
"Yessir. Where do you think we should look?"
"Sociopolitical analysis shows that the areas around Libya and Syria will be suitable. Revolutions are chaotic; people who are missing will be assumed to have died in the conflict or disappeared by the regimes."
"What about the social media sites? Won't disappearances spark communications there?"
"The social media sites are easily manipulated. I will deal with them." The voice sounded supremely confident in its assertion.
"Yessir. I'll start directing our bugout from Haiti. What about the Blazers."
"Ignore them for the time being. Let them be the philanthropists that they wish to be. Do this quickly, Rocky, but carefully. Remember, I replaced Dillinger, and I can replace you."
"Yessir. I won't fail."
"See that you don't. End of Line."
Ebony the Black Dragon
http://ebony14.livejournal.com

"Good night, and may the Good Lord take a Viking to you."

Ha ha ha ha! (x6)

I wanna troll em like they do in the /b/ad place
Post and watch em argue feed the flames started by me, I love it
Shock and indignation play the boards with threads I start
And after they die down I'll troll again 'cuz it's my art

Ell, oh ell oh ell oh ell, oh ell oh ell oh ell
Get collars hot, lets see what they got
Ell, oh ell oh ell oh ell, oh ell oh ell oh ell
Get collars hot, lets see what they got

Can't see my, can't see my, Oh can't you see my trollingface
(He gotta troll everybody)
Can't see my, can't see my, Oh can't you see my trollingface
(He gotta troll everybody)

T-t-t-trollingface, t-t-trollingface
(ha ha ha ha!)
T-t-t-trollingface, t-t-trollingface
(ha ha ha ha!)

(etc.)

- CD, this post is not itself meant as a troll, it's a song about the troll mindset. Or something.
--
"Anko, what you do in your free time is your own choice. Use it wisely. And if you do not use it wisely, make sure you thoroughly enjoy whatever unwise thing you are doing." - HymnOfRagnorok as Orochimaru at SpaceBattles
woot Med. Eng., verb, 1st & 3rd pers. prsnt. sg. know, knows

Well, is there any Inofficial Hymn of Fenspace?
As in all of Fenspace?
I ask this because today, while listening to some Rush, I thought that 'Closer to the Heart' and 'Freewill' may fit the bill...
But maybe that's just me... :p

I just saw http://www.fenspace.net/index.php5?title=Lancer-series]the page for this over on the FenWiki.

Bigger than a Peacemaker and as fast as a Blackbird? That's a lot of Cool being hogged...
--
Rob Kelk
"Governments have no right to question the loyalty of those who oppose
them. Adversaries remain citizens of the same state, common subjects of
the same sovereign, servants of the same law."

- Michael Ignatieff, addressing Stanford University in 2012

But it's just a lame, Space Adventures Astro Plan-level ripoff fusion of Macross and Gundam anyway. Still, I know there's at least a couple of other Mekton gearheads who frequent these boards and most of this is actually a framing scene, so here goes:

--------------------------------------------------------------------------

A secure meeting room, The Pentagon, Washington DC, 200x

"So some of the aliens are giants, so what?"

"So, despite being giants, aside form some very minor differences that we think are actually engineered adaptations - they can avoid poisoning from certain metals, chromium, strontium, a few others, by concentrating them in their hair follicles for example - these 'aliens' are human. Both the giants, and the normal sized ones."

"That's ridiculous. You'll be telling me they want to steal earth's women next."

"Ridculous? Maybe, but I'll tell you this - one of the females wasn't dead so long that we couldn't get viable ova samples from her body. After the other tests showed human genetics, they fertilised some with samples from a human."

"Are you seriously telling me there's alien halfbreeds growing in a lab somewhere? I didn't join the service to get wrapped up in a bad science fiction plot."

"No, of course not. The embryos were never implanted, and the one that was allowed to progress until a synthetic culture medium couldn't support it barely got to the size of a grain of sand before the cells died. It's just final proof that biologically speaking, they'rre human in every important way. But that's not the real important factor, it's that most of the bodies were big enoguh that with human proportions their bodies should have collapsed under their own mass, espescially since the onboard gravity was slightly higher than Earth-normal, if only by a few tencths of a percent."

"Again, so what? They have some kind of magic to break the laws of physics?"

"If you know science fiction, you'll know the adage that any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic. It seems that somewhere out there is an apparently human civilization that is sufficiently advanced."

"My nephew reads that crap, not me. I'm a practical man, Hudson. What's the bottom line that justifies spending millions on some boondoggle walking machines that as an old tank gunner I say would make lovely artillery targets and terrible armor profiles."

"Somehow, the giants' flesh is tougher than aluminum but still flexible when they want to move, and the only artificial structures we could find in the bodies was a nano-grown nervous system overlay to keep their reflex times to scale rather than relying on normal neurochemistry. We don't know how that worked, but we do know that someow, their humanoid war machines turn the pilot into some kind of quantum energy state, then reinforce their own structure just as much while hosting it. What's more, we got a volunteer to do it with one of the functional units. He came out of it as a giant after the first test, then switched at random several times through subsequent tests."

"I said bottom line, not more details. What's that all mean?"

"While the the war machine had a pilot, nothing smaller than a 105mm artillery shell could damage it. You could fire your old tank's gun at it all day and not even scrath the paint, General. We don't know why it works, but we have some idea how. A duplicate unit already exists in the lab, but there was a problem we didn't expect. We didn't have it connected to anything but test equipment. It's a good thing we used monkeys for test subjects instead of volunterers, they all came out catatonic, or at best showing signs of severe autism - until we mounted it in an articulated humanoid frame. Then, the clumsy hydraulics displayed much finer control than with an external operator and phsychological damage vanished. The bottom line? Any machine with one of these energy-state control cores is a superweapon, and only a machine shaped generally like the merged pilot can use one. That's why we need to spend millions on walking battle machines. Otherwise, we'd be helpless against them."

"I still don't like it, but I'll accept that for the sake of argument. Fine, there's humans flying around in space with super robots we'd have to go nuclear to stop. Far from ideal, and some kind of defense is obviously going to be neccessary, but what makes you so sure that they're going to be hostile? If they really aee human, at least some will be of course, but do we haver any evidence? Please don't tell me this is where the saucer nut stuff like crop circles and cattle mutilation comes in."

"No... if what we've extracted from the ship's computers is accurate, they don't bother with that kind of thing."

"Well that's a relief, at least -"

"-they go straight to orbital bombardment with megaton asteroids to suppres any native civilisation, then bring in processing ships the size of England to strip mine the planet's biological and mineral rescources right down to the point where the rock gets to be too soft and semi-molten to support large equipment, draining off the oceans along the way to fill the envirnonmental systems of the new ships that get built with the result. Then the ships get populated with a new crew, and set out to repeat the cycle."

"... That's not the kind of denial I wanted to hear, Hudson."

"I know, sir. It's not the kind of report I wanted to give."

"We don't always get what we want, do we, Hudson?"

"No sir."

"But it looks like this time, we're going to have to find the funding to get what we need. Alright, you have my support when you present this to the Joint Chiefs on Monday. The Air Force is going to balk, when they just barely got delivery on the F-22 in deployable numbers, but with my say so there should be at elast enough weight to get a Presidential review of this material as well, and I know Jack - he won't sit on this or dither around."

"I hope not, sir. I happen to like the continents the way they're currently arranged, and at least a few of the people living on them."

--------------------------------------------------------------------------

Game Start Time is around 20 years later, when the next alien ship shows up. They fight a few initial skirmishes because they recognise the tech-base, but are bewildered by the lack of a defense fleet eyond a few hundred cutters and even more by the lack of planetary harvesting going on, most of all by signs of a civilian population on the surface. Spies get sent down to try to figure out what in the galaxy is going on.... this is a different, altogether less rapacious, bunch of Homo Sapiens Xenoterrene. There may have been a small skirmish or two with scout ships like the first that crashed in the meantime, to keep governemtn interest focussed, or maybe the defenses are even more crap and the whole program got defunded one bit at a time until it was all but an in'name'only line item, with half-assed proof of concept models and downgraded but still formidable by local standards atmosphere-only mektons that take advantage of the merge piloting technology but nothing more. Mecha with a merged pilot get refined armor while the pilot is merged but Ablative otherwise.

Original concept includes several Mekton systems as standard equipment:

Merge with Your Mecha, obviously, and Esper Lens is meant to be inheerent to the Merge system as well. Espers as such are vanishingly rare among earth's population, though, and what few there are, are mainly martial artists with the more subtle powers - things like Aura Sensing, Psycjhometry, and Stat Boost, not Energy Manipulation, Telepathy, or Teleportation. That doesn't mean all pilots are active espers - though all pilots will have a Psi stat above zero, or the system doesn't work well enough to give combat-worthy results, call it a -5 Mecha Reflex penalty with Psi 0.

Transformation (Fighter) possibly Hybrid as well by Rule of Cool but it would require an unusually flexible mind not to go insane in such a form, or someone who thought they were sometimes a bird with arms or a flying hunchback. Noteably, Fighter form requires a normal cockpit and does not have the refined armor bonus. This is required because the Gravatic drive system (which is the only practical way to make a fighter operate at even interplanetary range) only operates in an arrowhead-shaped volume and energy cost per unit speed goes up drastically as volume increases, so getting a Humanoid form up to the same speed as a Fighter form is much more difficult. As per standard CP rules, except now there's a reaon beyond the aerodynamics which don't apply in space battles. The garvity drive does provide convenient psuedo-aerodynamic directional control, however, and constant "thrust" (energy input) equals a constant degree of spacetime deformation and hence constant velocity. In other words, f*** physics, this is space opera! Only not really, we only get to break physics along specifically codified lines.

Regeneration (TL9) This self-repair function also makes the mecha slowly alter themselves for higher performance and to best suit the pilot who uses them, and in the process get worse for anyone else - since the listed systems will make them quite expensive, call it -1 M.Ref per 200cp of modification from the standard model. This is probably how the interestingly-insane-would-never-make-it-in-the-military-but-there's-a-war-on pilot whose mecha gains a Hybrid form comes in, most likely.

Vague plot ideas from here involve allying with the new alien faction, fighting off the nastybad aliens, and possibly conquering the galaxy with the power of hot blooded pilots and/or j-pop idol singers, probable blue haired alien hotties (metal concentrating hair follicles, remember? Chomium got its name for a reason!) but nothing overly detailed. Except that its definitely meant to be more Macross in overall tone than Gundamned.

- CD
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"Anko, what you do in your free time is your own choice. Use it wisely. And if you do not use it wisely, make sure you thoroughly enjoy whatever unwise thing you are doing." - HymnOfRagnorok as Orochimaru at SpaceBattles
woot Med. Eng., verb, 1st & 3rd pers. prsnt. sg. know, knows