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 Post Posted: Thu Feb 14, 2019 7:03 pm 
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"So you want us to take the Seeker by ourselves? I don't think we have the ammunition to clear out the army without support."

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 Post Posted: Fri Feb 15, 2019 12:08 am 
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Nate hustles off to take out those ballistae as well as any other siege equipment.

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 Post Posted: Fri Feb 15, 2019 7:11 pm 
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Arkady nods. "We do, but if you would rather be using grenades I can drag the gun to a suitable arrow slit. If things go badly...well, if I hear a call for support on the radio I'll be in position to give it."

He turns to the Baron. "Can I borrow two men for five minutes to carry a weapon to an arrow slit just above ground level, preferably overlooking the causeway from the side?"

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 Post Posted: Fri Feb 15, 2019 9:38 pm 
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Felix will find a cart and attach it to the truck for the plan before he heads up to the wall.

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 Post Posted: Sun Feb 17, 2019 4:17 am 
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Roger finds that his Barrel Of Herbs is more than enough to add them to all the barrels of pitch. Getting them to produce more than a trickle of smoke isn't exactly simple...

Roger: Science: +5 Roll: +2 Target: +4
Aspect established across the field outside the Castle: Poisonous Smoke.


Roger is, however, more than up to the task. He manages to arrange for the barrels to produce prodigious quantities of smoke, covering Count Groan's army in great big clouds of dirty, poisonous smog.

Nate heads off to take on the ballistae:

Nathan: Guns: +5 Roll: +2 Total: +7
Ballista Team 1: Athletics: +0 Roll: +2 Total: +2


A brief rattle of gunfire leaves the first ballista technically unharmed, but suddenly no longer in possession of a crew to fire it, leaving it fairly useless. Only the second ballista remains.

Arkady finds that he has no trouble getting some help setting up his machine gun. He even manages to get a few dozen shots off before the clouds of smoke begin to cover the field...

Arkady: Guns: +2 Roll: +1 Total: +3
Incoming Army: Special: Total: +0
Total shifts against the army: 3


Arkady's gun extracts a grim toll from the Count's army; but he quickly notices a difference between this army and any other one he's ever seen.

In a normal army, people react to being shot. They try to stop the bleeding; or they shoot back; or they yell curses. Or something. This is the first time that Arkady's seen a large group of people simply ignore the fact that they are being shot at.

It's not as if the shots don't deal damage. They deal plenty of damage, and Arkady destroys dozens of the soldiers. But a single soldier will take a dozen or more bullets and, as long as he remains physically capable of moving forward, he just won't stop. If he doesn't remain physically capable of moving forward, then he collapses where he is and those behind him simply charge on over him, each row of soldiers in effect acting as ablative armour for those behind them.

Felix doesn't really have time to personally hook a cart up to the truck and get on the wall with his grenade launcher; he rapidly deputises Theresa to handle the cart, while he takes his visor up to the wall to fire his grenades. (It's not like he needs a spotter. An entire army is a hard target to miss.)

Felix: Guns: +2 Visor: +4 Roll: +3 Total: +9
Invading army: Special: +0
Total shifts against the army: 12


Unlike Arkady's bullets, Felix' grenades do garner a response from the Seeker-puppeted soldiers (possibly because of the Seeker's chittering commands from the rear). Specifically, every time that a grenade lands, the nearest soldier immediately dives on top of it, taking almost the entire explosion on himself and saving his teammates. This reduces the grenade from a weapon of mass destruction to the equivalent of a slow-firing rifle; only hitting a single soldier per shot.

By firing several grenades in close proximity, however, Felix nonetheless manages to collapse a large pit in front of the charging army; plenty of the mindless soldiers march blindly into the pit, blunting a large part of their advance.

Meanwhile, Theresa successfully attaches the cart and will be able to return to her spotting position next round.

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

At the back of the army, the Seeker chitters and buzzes, sounding like a whole lot of cicadas in some sort of echo chamber, the Count's army dancing to its tune like puppets to a puppetmaster. Right up until the clouds of smoke begin to envelop the battlefield.

There's another loud insectile screeeeeeeeeeam, this one fading into the distance and accompanied by the sound of retreating hoofbeats, as the Seeker apparently decides that it would not be best served by remaining in this area.

The Seeker has fled.

Even without the Seeker, though, Count Groan's army marches on relentlessly. The sudden appearance of a pit in front of them has many soldiers walking over the edge and falling directly on top of those who had recently been in front of them, but in several places the puppet soldiers reach the moat, bridging it with the planks that they are carrying and crossing over. Alstrom's crossbowmen empty their quivers at the invaders as quickly as they can, and several of the incoming army are laid low by either Arkady's bullets or Alstrom's men's bolts; but it seems that for every one that falls, two more march on out of the smoke.

The second ballista keeps firing at the walls:

Ballista: Guns: +1 Roll: -1 Total: +0
Alstrom's Men: Athletics: +1 Roll: -2 Total: -1
Total shifts against Alstrom's Men: 1


Alstrom's Men: Crossbows: +1 Roll: -1 Total: +0
Invading Army: Special: +0
Total shifts against the army: 12

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 Post Posted: Sun Feb 17, 2019 4:35 am 
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"Well, so much for capturing the Seeker..." Felix grumbles. "At least we don't have to worry about it anymore, though."

Felix takes aim at the mass of soldiers trying to cross the moat and unleashes several more volleys of grenades.

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 Post Posted: Sun Feb 17, 2019 3:30 pm 
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Idly wondering if the Seeker did something to the poor bastards out on that causeway to make them more physically robust, Arkady loads another pannier onto the gun and fires at the planks the attackers are laying down to cross the moat. Under the circumstances, he's tagging Defensive Pacifist and thinking ill of Azash.

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 Post Posted: Thu Feb 21, 2019 3:50 pm 
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I definitely played too many video games as a kid. Thought getting rid of the seeker would win the battle for us out right.

Roger quickly finds Piper.

Does the fact that the Seeker has fled help us in any way??

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 Post Posted: Sun Feb 24, 2019 1:01 am 
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Nate shifts his aim to the other ballista.

Nathan: Guns: +5 Roll: +0 Total: +5
Ballista Team 2: Athletics: +0 Roll: +0 Total: +0


This time, he puts a few bullets through a vital arm of the ballista itself, snapping the wood. The Seeker-puppeted crew continues to load and fire the ballista, though the ballista bolt now travels a grand total of about two feet.

The crew responds to this by loading the same bolt back into the ballista and firing it the same two feet all over again. Doubtless they will be at this for a while.

Arkady continues firing into the clouds of smoke, tearing up plenty of planks.

Arkady: Guns: +2 Aspect: +2 Roll: +0 Hitting the planks: +2 Total: +6
Incoming army: Special: Total: +0
Total shifts against the army: 18/100


Arkady's fire takes down several planks - from this angle he can't get all of them (it's a very narrow firing slot) but dozens of soldiers nonetheless fall into the moat and find themselves trying (and failing) to breathe water.

Felix, with Theresa now adding her pistols to his fire, continues to fire at the leading end of the army.

Felix: Guns: +2 Visor: +4 Sidekick: +4 Roll: +1 Total: +11
Incoming army: Special: Total: +0
Total shifts against army: 29/100


Mush to Felix' dismay, firing a grenade near to the soldiers still leads to the nearest soldier leaping onto said grenade. Presumably the Seeker left them with a command along the lines of "if he fires one of those things, then the nearest one of you jumps on it" or similar. However, this strategy is a good deal less successful for the soldiers when Felix' grenade lands on the plank they are laying across the moat - sure, it prevents shrapnel, but it doesn't prevent the grenade from shattering the plank, dumping all the soldiers from that plank into the moat (where, apparently, they no longer have the presence of mind to hold their breath). However, there are a lot of planks (and a lot of soldiers) and even Felix' best efforts can't stop them all from crossing the moat.

Roger tracks down Piper and asks a question, to which she immediately responds.

"Yes," she says, sounding slightly distracted.

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

With both ballistae down, Count Groan's army is no longer in any state to launch any sort of ranged attacks this round - a fact that Alstrom's men are quite grateful for. However, a few of the invading soldiers do make it across the moat, and start placing ladders against the wall. Unless somehow prevented, the leaders of the invading army will likely reach the top of the wall in two or three rounds.

Alstrom's men continue to fire their crossbows:

Alstrom's Men: Crossbows: +1 Roll: -1 Total: +0
Invading Army: Special: +0
Total shifts against the army: 29/100

Total shift taken by Alstrom's men: 1/50

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 Post Posted: Sun Feb 24, 2019 1:54 am 
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Roger nods. "Understood."

He returns to the top of the wall, to fire grenades at planks and push ladders away from the wall.

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 Post Posted: Sun Feb 24, 2019 2:57 am 
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Felix sighs. His grenades are next to useless and he can't keep coming up with improvised ways to use them. He's about to switch out to an assault rifle with expanded drum magazines when he gets an idea. Running to the soldiers loading pitch into catapults, he conscripts a few soldiers to start throwing buckets of the stuff over the castle walls and especially around the ladders.

As the soldiers bucket brigade pitch over the side of the wall, Felix switches to incendiary grenades and opens fire on the ladders.

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 Post Posted: Tue Feb 26, 2019 9:26 pm 
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Arkady will keep the number of planks down to a minimum. If he can, he'll move the mount to better bear on them.

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 Post Posted: Wed Feb 27, 2019 2:07 pm 
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Having taken out both ballistae, Nate switches his aim to the incoming army...

Nathan: Guns: +5 Roll: +0 Total: +5
Invading Army: Special: +0
Total shifts against the army: 34/100


Nate takes out swathes of soldiers with almost contemptous ease.

Arkady's arrow-slit has a limited field of view - he can certainly prevent the army from doing much in the areas he can see, but he can't cover the whole moat from here. Nonetheless, he does what he can...

Arkady: Guns: +2 Roll: +3 Targeting the planks: +2 Total: +7
Invading Army: Special: +0
Total shifts against the army: 41/100


Not only does he keep the soldier from crossing the area of moat that his gun commands, but he also manages to weaken the far shore of the moat, to the point where it will (and does) crumble easily under the weight of a fully loaded plank, dumping plenty of soldiers in the water. It is also very clear that the Seeker's instructions said nothing about swimming.

Initial ladders get placed here and there alone the wall - mostly in areas along the very wide army front that the Terrans had not been concentrating on - and Felix has some soldiers pour pitch around the base of a particularly heavy concentration of ladders. While he puts his plan into motion, Theresa keeps up her fire...

Felix: Engineering: +5 Sidekick: +4 Roll: +1 Total: +10
Invading Army: Special: +0
Total shifts against the army: 51/100


There's a FWOMPH as the pitch catches alight, and flames race up and down the affected area. The puppeted soldiers continue to march into the blaze without stopping or even attempting to put it out - into and through the blaze. Felix watches as the leading soldiers, despite the fact that they themselves are ablaze, climb on out of the flames, up the ladders, heading at the same controlled, unhurried pace they've used all along - merrily burning even as they head up towards where Felix is waiting for them.

Fortunately for the castle defenders, the wooden ladders are very much not fireproof, and about as the leaders get halfway up the ladders there's a nasty little crackling noise and several ladders collapse, carrying the burning soldiers with them.

Roger takes himself and his guns up to the top of the Castle wall, and starts firing at various planks (mainly ones that can't be seen from Arkady's arrow slit)

Roger: Guns: +2 Roll: +1 Total: +3
Invading Army: Special: +0
Total shifts against the army: 54/100


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

Though the Terrans have taken down all but a few of their ladders, there are still a couple of leading soldiers who manage to scale the wall. Any sensible soldier would have waited for reinforcements before coming up, because Count Alstrom's men are no fools - every soldier who gains the wall meets a dozen enemies with spears ready to push him right back off said wall again.

But the invaders are no longer sensible soldiers, and charge directly into the impossible odds themselves.

Invaders: Weapons: +1 Very Bad Tactics: -3 Roll: -3 Total: -5
Alstrom's Men: Spears: +1 Roll: -1 Total: +0


Honestly, they might as well not have bothered - a grand total of three enemy soldiers make the top of the wall this round, and Alstrom's men push them back off the wall without taking so much as a scratch themselves.

But one should not imagine that Alstrom's crossbowmen have been idle in the interval.

Alstrom's Men: Crossbows: +1 Roll: +0 Total: +1
Invading Army: Special: +0
Total shifts against the army: 55/100


The invaders may be getting closer, but the defenders are making them pay for the distance they gain in blood.

What with all the smoke and flames about the battlefield, it's hard to tell, but it looks as if Groan's army has been taking down from around twice as big as Alstrom's to more or less a similar size.

Total shift taken by Alstrom's men: 1/50

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 Post Posted: Wed Feb 27, 2019 5:28 pm 
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Felix puts the grenade launcher away and grabs an assault rifle. Working together with Theresa, he shoots down the enemy soldiers as they try to climb what remains of the ladders.

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 Post Posted: Fri Mar 01, 2019 3:42 pm 
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If Arkady's out of targets, he'll shift to a new firing spot where he can intercept other crossers. Otherwise he'll stay put and keep them from crossing the span between the causeway and the castle (he should have no problem seeing that from where he is). Who knows, they may run out of planks at this rate.

Tag Defensive Pacifist for a reroll if he does really badly.

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