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Yvonmukluk posted:I think we want to try and keep a close eye on how things develop on the Free State front if we can. If either of us get too successful too quickly, the Dictator might be willing to reach a compromise with them (which, after all, is what the Free State wants) so he can then turn around and smash us in a Luderndorff offensive-type attack. We want that fight to be as long and drawn out as possible. Not sure if we'd have any realy option to somehow effect that front, but we need to keep that in mind. While a good point, we also have to keep in mind what Yooper said about internal stability - if we dilly-dally then the good Count's forces could implode. We need to act with speed without falling victim to haste.
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Apr 18, 2017 23:35
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Zaodai posted:Clearly our opening move is to find out where El Presidente is and air drop our completely unprepared and no jump training troops in to try and capture or kill him before he knows we're there. That sounds dangerously logical (if a very wonky kind of logical). Rather, after finding El Presidente all of our mercs should pile into their Geo Metro (somehow) and perform the world's most inept drive by shooting. More guns means more chances to hit, and more bodies means more chances at least one of them will make it back alive! 
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Apr 18, 2017 23:39
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 Just when I thought this LP couldn't impress me any more.  I've got a hunch that the Japanese PMC will sign on with the dictator - since if I recall correctly he's the one with the big bucks right now he could easily cough up the cash for an expensive outfit like them (particularly since he might be seen as a more reliable employer than the Free State). I think that our first priority should be to knock out the weaker PMC (i.e. the Sultan's forces) - with them out of the road we can more easily focus on our other opponent. Of course, we should also keep in mind the potential for these PMCs to not just duke it out with us but also to tangle with one another. I have no idea how we could do it, but perhaps it might be worth trying to get them to focus on each other rather than us? I also quite like the backstory Yvonmukluk wrote up. Good job! xthetenth posted:Then what do they fight with? The 2x4s left behind after Ground Merc Thunderdome, duh. Soup Inspector fucked around with this message at 18:02 on Apr 19, 2017 |
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Apr 19, 2017 17:59
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Quinntan posted:I disagree with your assessment, though that is because I am presuming that SHARM are going to be a bit more risk-averse, due to the rarity and cost of their assets. I do think that if they lose the Viper Zeroes and the Wedgetail, that's it for them, whereas there isn't really anything like that for the Sultan. Their aircraft are cheaper and more numerous, giving them a bit more capability to sustain losses and replacing them will be somewhat easier too. That's a perfectly sound position to take - I'm kind of leaning toward the Sultan simply because their assets are less likely to inflict losses on us (and so we could go into a fight with the other guys with less attrition). There's also a bit of self-interest involved here since I'd like to keep flying as long as possible, and picking a fight with a peer/near-peer competitor doesn't seem conducive to my survival whilst I'm still flying a SK60B. 
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Apr 19, 2017 18:06
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Quinntan posted:The real way to do it would be to try and catch them on the ground. Try and figure out when their wedgetail lands and then scream in at high speed. If we pull it off right, you'll get another chance to rocket expensive high-end fighters on the ground. Welp, time to try to figure out how long a Wedgetail could stay in the air, when they'd hit bingo fuel, and whether they can be mid-air refuelled. That'd at least give us an "extreme" scenario to start planning around. Maybe plant mercs to watch comings and goings from their base and use that to plan accordingly?
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Apr 19, 2017 18:16
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As sorely tempting as it is to get Rohan in on this and although Bogan would be amusing/very useful in his own way, I think I'm due for a Zack attack. I want to see what those CIA operatives can do.
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Apr 19, 2017 22:40
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I think we should be able to nail the diamond mine trucks with a pair of Tornados using Tauruses. Pop up, fire at the trucks, land back at base, quick turnaround for a SEAD loadout, and return to the battlefield. Job done!
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Apr 24, 2017 19:14
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I'll refrain from voting for now, since I need to refresh my memory. That Kickstarter is certainly... uh... something. As other goons have said, it seems like we dodged a bullet! And I'm probably sounding like a broken record at this point but I liked the interview snippet posted earlier.
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Apr 25, 2017 16:20
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Haven't gotten an opportunity to watch the video the whole way through, but I'd like to second the motion on us SK60B drivers getting first dibs on airframe upgrades (and, presumably, selling the SK60Bs and painting our new rides in the Dragon Slayers style). We've gotten very lucky so far, but from the sounds of things it's starting to get very dicey. I'd rather not have all of us get shot down at a stroke because we thought we could stretch our luck just one more mission. e: Also voting K+P because it's a no-brainer.
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Apr 30, 2017 22:03
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sparkmaster posted:I really don't like using our most expensive, most capable aircraft as SAM bait. Only if anyone who suggests such a thing comes along with... in the SK60B(s) in question. 
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May 1, 2017 01:39
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Put me down as another guy who wants us to nab those Kfirs!
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May 1, 2017 17:57
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Let's not get overambitious at this stage, folks. Sure, we've managed to pull off some frankly ridiculous stunts, but there's only so many times we can drop our pants and moon our enemies before we get shot in the rear end. It's worth remembering that it's been a close run thing a few times as well. With that in mind, we should not let ourselves get distracted by the Free State or get our teeth broken because we got cocky: coastal CAS all the way. C'mon, let's do it for Benjamin and his family. Speaking of which... Yvonmukluk posted:human-interest stories I quite enjoyed this. You nailed the style quite well in my opinion.
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May 9, 2017 13:08
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I think we're getting out of Angola at the right time, folks. If I was feeling suicidal I'd say that if we eventually get an opportunity to rake export Raptors on the ground and we still have the SK60s by then for some godforsaken reason, we should let them deliver the coup-de-grace and add another decal to them: Raptor Reapers.  And if we'd voted for Don't Cut The Rope I would have been very disappointed since that'd be giving the PRC the perfect opportunity to begin dicking us over as hard as they'd like. As a few other goons have said, the PRC is all but begging for an opportunity to let them cut loose, and "Those crazy irresponsible mercs just attacked a sovereign nation - one in the UN, no less - without any provocation whatsoever" would be the perfect excuse to begin kicking our teeth in. Hell, in the worst case scenario iPMC and Tesla might have joined in to help eliminate some up-and-coming competition, all with an excellent justification. So good job not doing that! (not being sarcastic there) Night10194 posted:It's gonna be hilarious watching businessmen try to 'disrupt' the global military industry and gently caress up massively because they don't know poo poo about what they're doing. Amen. Soup Inspector fucked around with this message at 15:35 on May 13, 2017 |
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May 13, 2017 15:33
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I really don't think it's wise to try going for Shadowban. Yooper is a fair GM, but I don't think he's going to pull punches if we start pissing off the UN with a goddamn Chinese CBG with a grudge and an excellent excuse lurking off the coast. We're good, but we're not "give a carrier and its escorts the middle finger and hope that one of the big fish will care enough to save our asses" good. We should focus on driving on to Luanda and only devote enough resources to stall/halt the Free State. We can always thumb our noses at the UN/China another time.
Soup Inspector fucked around with this message at 16:20 on May 14, 2017 |
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May 14, 2017 16:18
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Crazycryodude posted:The UN is even more toothless and limp-wristed in this grimdark future than it is today, the carrier battlegroup is 2 lovely ski-jump carriers way out on the end of their supply lines, and we've got Col. Musk and the 201st iProduct Sustainment Wing between us and the Chinese. Leaving aside the physical dangers, the problem is that as you pointed out even if the UN is toothless it'll make us look like the bad guys. That in turn could end up making certain clients reluctant to hire us (could you see another Van Hoff wanting to hire mercs who intentionally hit a target on a neutral UN member state's sovereign territory?). This stuff isn't just going to affect the operational picture, it's also got the risk of hitting us in the wallet. e: You also seem to be assuming that the iPMC and Tesla will give a poo poo rather than just going "Meh, I guess this is Free State territory now" if we get hit hard. They don't give a drat as long as the people in charge of Angola aren't China, Tesla (in Apple's case), or the dictator. Soup Inspector fucked around with this message at 16:29 on May 14, 2017 |
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May 14, 2017 16:26
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Stago Lego posted:Shouldn't we focus on the dictator? If we can storm the capital won't that be enough for the count, allowing him to enter the negotiation top dog? This is what I'm thinking, but we'll probably need to devote some forces to keeping the Free State busy regardless. I think someone pointed out our position is currently a bit precarious w.r.t. the Free State's latest gains.
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May 14, 2017 16:34
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Red-handed. We're better than having to resort to something so sloppy as murdering anyone who happens to look at the wrong thing.
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May 16, 2017 14:15
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orcbuster posted:Also, why haven't we been using the MW-1 more? This thing is awesome beyond measure! Are our Saudi Tornados even able to take that? Ignoring that for the moment, I think it's also worth keeping in mind that during the Gulf War (I want to say) it turned out that the RAF's equivalent system made the Tornado surprisingly vulnerable to IADS. Though that doesn't make it any less metal.
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May 18, 2017 17:21
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I think it'd be rather dull if we were forced to standardise on a few airframes. I like the fact we've got such an eclectic collection. Aside from the fact that it underlines we're a bunch of scrappy mercs, it also lets us see more interesting aircraft than "F-15s/Gripens/whatever forever and ever".
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May 20, 2017 17:31
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I'm just going to hope that we got sprayed with shrapnel rather than the drat thing ramming its nose right into the cockpit, because that way we'll get to come back. I might even get to write lovely fiction about it. I knew this was only a matter of time!   e: I'll edit this in the morning if it reveals too much.
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May 22, 2017 03:44
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Hey, Yooper, question: if memory serves up until now you've been assuming that anyone who gets shot down survives and gets medevac'd. What about cases like poor Survivor and I where we eat a Guideline to the face? In those scenarios survival seems... unlikely but I'm awful at coming up with callsigns (I've also gotten weirdly attached to my pixelpilot  ) and I like the idea of Survivor living up to his name.
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May 22, 2017 14:32
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Crazycryodude posted:Always possible you punched out before the missile turned the cockpit into a cloud of shrapnel. That's my own pet theory if Yooper says that it's kosher. As for Angola, things at least sound like they could get better. You go, guys!  Not sure how to feel about Tesla and Apple providing guidance, though... in the best case scenario it means that no-one's going to mess with Angola because they'll get smacked down hard if they do. In the worst case scenario we're going to get a form of Free State shenanigans despite our best efforts. When it comes to procurement... I'm not any good at that stuff, I'll wait and see what everyone comes up with.
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May 22, 2017 14:43
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Yvonmukluk posted:Doesn't ejecting usually gently caress up your body quite bad to the point they ground you from flying any ejector-equipped aircraft again? Yeah, if memory serves it compresses (and fucks up) your spine.
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May 22, 2017 14:57
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There's also arguably a difference between pissing off one major international player and pissing them all off, no? e: Okay, "all" is hyperbole but let's not get too many movers and shakers trying to take our heads off before we can return the favour!
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May 23, 2017 21:40
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omegasgundam posted:Has there been an info-post about munitions types yet? I'll admit to being more than a bit confused over all of the different types and configurations of Paveways and the like. Okay, Added Space has already gotten the general stuff so I'll try to answer your secondary questions in (slightly more) detail. Please do not take what I'm about to write as the gospel truth, I'm relying on  and Wikipedia to fill in gaps, and more importantly I don't know how they behave in CMANO. With that said, I present to you...Bandit's Book of Big Booms Brimstone Brimstone is a fire and forget (F&F) air to ground (A-G/A2G) Anti-Tank Guided Missile (ATGM). It's very similar to the Hellfire missile, if you're at all familiar with that. It relies upon a milimetre wave (mmW) radar to ensure accuracy even against moving targets; another plus is that their tandem charge warheads create relatively little collateral damage. Dual mode Brimstones also have a laser seeker that allows for buddy lasing (i.e. another weapons platform illuminates the target with a laser that the Brimstone then homes in on). There's the Brimstone 2 but I know relatively little about that. AGM-65 Maverick Probably the iconic air launched ATGM prior to the Hellfire coming around, the Maverick is an older F&F design dating from the mid to late Cold War. Apparently they're a bit less deadly than Brimstones. The exact means of guidance depends on the variant, of which there's a veritable alphabet. AGM-65A/B use electro-optical guidance (i.e. are "TV guided"). AGM-65D/F/G are IR guided (i.e. use thermal emissions to detect and track targets). AGM-65E uses a laser seeker (literally just follows a laser to the target). AGM-65H/J/K use a charge-coupled device, which as far as I can tell is just a fancier form of TV guidance. Mjolnir/Bombkapsel 90 (BK90) Called a 'submunitions dispenser' by our Swedish friends, the Mjolnir is a gliding stand-off (i.e. fired from range) cluster bomb system designed to engage and defeat enemy tanks with a minimum of unexploded ordinance hassle (UXO). It's actually proving surprisingly hard to find any info on this one, and I've been mostly focusing on "my end" of our operations so I don't have much experience of it in action. Sorry.  Short range A-A missiles A-A being "air to air" (A2A). This category includes the Sidewinder, IRIS-T, R-73/AA-11 Archer, and ASRAAM. Almost all of these designs are IR guided - i.e. "heatseekers". It's worth noting at this point that these missiles are usually described as being [x] aspect, where [x] denotes what facing the target can be at relative to the missile and still be tracked. Earlier designs are rear aspect only - that is, if the target is doing anything other than facing directly away the missile will be unable to guide on it. Early Sidewinders - basically everything before AIM-9L if memory serves - were notoriously unreliable, though to be fair this was true of contemporary air to air missiles too. These missiles can only be used within spitting distance in aeronautical terms (about 12 nautical miles), but they're extremely agile. Medium range A-A missiles This is where you'll start seeing radar guidance. AMRAAM, Meteor, and R-27/AA-10 Alamo are examples. These missiles, as the name suggests, are normally used at ranges between the short range designs' "knife fight in a phone booth" and the long range "if I squint I can kinda see 'em". Although less agile, they're also pretty fast. Some missiles have to be guided to the target for the entirety of their flight (beam riding), others only for most of their flight and then engage a terminal seeker on the missile to hunt down the target themselves, and lastly true F&F missiles that can be fired and forgotten about. The special thing about Meteor is that it uses a ramjet engine, which means it goes absurdly fast and it's very nimble to boot - it's also got quite a long range. Long range/BVR A-A missiles The big boys, these are exclusively radar guided. Examples include AIM-54 Phoenix and R-40/AA-6 Acrid. Though about as manoeuvrable as a slab of concrete, they go very fast and hit hard. BVR, or Beyond Visual Range means that a missile is long legged enough to hit targets out from beyond... well... visual range. But usually you want to wait a bit so that your missile doesn't bleed off all its speed. A special note about some Russian/Soviet air to air missiles: depending on the variant a different seeker may be mated on the same body - so one will have IR guidance and one will have radar guidance. Don't assume a Russian A-A missile has a given type of guidance without checking the variant! fake e: Beaten like Dos Santos's last Air Marshal but gently caress it
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May 24, 2017 01:50
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Put me down for these: 1. K&P CAS 2. Ivanov CAS 3. BFLM CAS It's CAS all the way down... (not to be confused with Support!)
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May 24, 2017 15:09
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Balkans, sell the SK60Bs
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May 25, 2017 20:36
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My brain demands putting my vote in with Mitsuhashi, though my heart is with the Natives. Partially because although we can still make cash in various ways with the Native Corp., it's going to be dicier (of course this will make missions more exciting but also means margins of error are a bit too tight for my liking). We can't help the downtrodden of the world if we're loving broke. And if you don't think Mitsubishi is going to help its fellow Japanese megacorp (which have been been explicitly noted to have shares in one another, implying a vested interest in Mitsuhashi's success) by calling in its favour with us at the absolute worst possible moment then you're a damned fool.
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May 26, 2017 14:12
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I've already mentioned it before, but it bears repeating: there is a very good chance that Mitsubishi (who, need I remind you, definitely have a dog in this fight - albeit indirectly - due to shares in Mitsuhashi) will use their leverage to kick us in the balls if we go for someone other than Mitsuhashi. How? I can easily envision a scenario, for example, where we'll need to do something directly counter to the interests of our employers if we don't want Mitsubishi telling all and sundry the truth behind the trawler. And that isn't something we can easily shrug off, unless we suddenly want to render all of that agonising and planning to avoid the reputation hit completely irrelevant. Meanwhile, if we were working for Mitsuhashi, any favours we might do for Mitsubishi would likely align with our employers' interests and therefore avoid a lose-lose situation.
Soup Inspector fucked around with this message at 20:18 on May 26, 2017 |
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May 26, 2017 20:15
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Galaga Galaxian posted:Mitsubishi is probably gonna try to cash their "favor" regardless of what side we're on. Agreed. The point I was ineptly trying to make was that when that time comes, it's better to be with the group where acquiescing won't have a high probability of pissing off our employers (since Mitsubishi will likely want Mitsuhashi to succeed, so if we're against them they'll probably want us to do something that helps Mitsuhashi and hurts the other guys - and since we'd be employed by the other guys, well...). Whereas the other options carry a non-zero risk that no matter what we do - doing Mitsubishi a 'favour' or telling them to get hosed - things are going to go poorly. It's entirely possible that I'm jumping at shadows and bigging up a danger that simply doesn't exist. I'll happily admit I'm wrong if need be. But it's worth at least considering the risks, right? Soup Inspector fucked around with this message at 21:37 on May 26, 2017 |
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May 26, 2017 21:35
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Galaga Galaxian posted:I dunno, it wouldn't surprise me if some Mitsubishi exec tries cashing our favor to advance his career at some Mitsuhashi Exec's expense. Now that's a fair point I hadn't considered (or more accurately had been giving short shrift). I 100% trust Yooper not to force us into a "gotcha!" situation, but I don't think he'll give us an easy ride either - and I don't think he mentioned Mitsuhashi and Mitsubishi's links for the hell of it. My gut feeling is that the unpleasant choice scenario is more likely if we plump for a non-Mitsuhashi employer. I'd love to be wrong, though.
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May 26, 2017 21:43
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Well, this thread just took a turn for the  . Joe is a very good boy and Gervasius' cat is a very good kitty! Give them some petting on our behalf, please.I'll try to figure out who we should pick later.
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May 27, 2017 01:15
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I want to give Zack a shot at least once. As for our l33t cyb3rh4ck0r friend, I'm sure we could keep him busy by trash talking his favourite video games or whatever on his usual haunts. Since I am still a shattered husk of a man I'll be stuck spoiling our assitant's* dog I guess! *Or whatever Yooper's IC role is, I forgot Tevery Best posted:All right, you bunch of jabronis. This is magical.  And if our ground merc component has petered out during THUNDERDOME, that's a crying shame. Digging Statoil's Viking Division. Do they go all in on the stereotypical viking imagery? Galaga Galaxian posted:So is this the Toyota Method they're going on about? That is in fact the "Toyota Method" they're talking about. I'm curious to see how deep the dumb corporate culture shenanigans rabbit hole goes with Mitsuhashi.
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May 27, 2017 15:48
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quote:Once they'd "secured" the airfields they flew in a few plane loads of people to take over the boats. Yah. Boats. Not only did they capture the Sea Shepherd but also a group of surplus French missile boats. The Flagship, F 792 Premier Maitre L'Her is somewhere near Savoonga. We're not sure how operational those ships are just yet. On land they've got other French ground units including some Roland AA. And, unfortunately, some Mamba's. Emphasis mine. We may want to consider having our aircraft bank sharply to orbit Provd as they climb to altitude so that none of them end up getting nailed by a Mamba because we happened to plow merrily straight into them whilst still low and slow.
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May 29, 2017 15:10
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Depending on the location they can almost reach our birds the moment they take off from Provd.
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TildeATH posted:Can we get the Spruce Goose but done up like a gunship. I think you mean the Spook Goose. (I know the aircraft you're referencing is called a "Spooky" but it flows better this way) I'm gonna third the other two guys, this LP - and everyone's contributions - is a treasure.
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Jun 1, 2017 00:04
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I'm going to second power crystals' thoughts on asking Twitch chat: as a European it's extremely unlikely I'll ever be online when the streams happen (hell, I only happened to be online for the helicopter shoot down because of a combination of pure accident and  ).As for what happened, from the sounds of it it was a mixed bag. But moments like these help inject some tension because they remind us that we're not guaranteed a win, and they also force us out of our comfort zone in terms of planning.
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Jun 6, 2017 15:34
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Yooper posted:The Voice of Cobbie came up with a really great idea in regards to future missions. I'm going to work in video cutscenes depending on contingencies. Or maybe Audio Cutscenes would be the better way to word it. So mid-mission, live in the stream, we'll get audio updates from our folks in the field. This LP gets better and better... and props to the goons who've taken up their pens, too! I'm going to plump for sub hunting.
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Jun 8, 2017 14:14
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I like Bacarruda's idea. And I think it's safe to say we're all rooting for you, Yooper - kick cancer's rear end!
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Jun 23, 2017 11:11
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