Bleakbane Plays BATTLETECH, Part Twenty-Five

Bleakbane Plays BATTLETECH, Part Twenty-Five:

Will be a short one today; got to knock it off early, because we're out early tomorrow morning for a much-needed tomato-soup-in-the-car day trip.

Okay, so two 2-skull and two 3-skull missions to choose from (all from Davion). Lynessa somewhat arbitrarily elected to start with a 2-skull test drive, the Davions wanting to further test a Cataphract 1x by killing some pirates.

Natasha would get the "honour" of driving that; Luximai the Fair Marauder, Zuranna the BattleSmasher and Llana the actual honour of testing out the Awesome (all these missions being delightfully polar or tundra, for a change.)

The enemy would be a lance of light mechs, with enemy reinforcements on the way. No, tell a lie, it was Taurians, also likely nothing but light mechs.

The lance fell back a bit. No rush, maybe if they were lucky, the two sides would shoot each other up. They couldn't fall back FAR, because of Llana being in a very slow mech, but they figured they might as well.

Nah, two Commandos and a Javelin entered sight before the Taurians even showed up on the sensors.

First salvo from the Awesome!

With the extra damage boost from the TAG, Natasha blew the Commando apart.

No sense trying for headshots here, it wasn't worth it - the lance went for CT kills.

The forth pirate mech was another Javelin. One of the two decided to try and hit Zuranna's head AGAIN, but she had the cockpit mod, so she was fine.

Aside from that, the enemy lance really didn't stand much of a chance.

The Taurians had apparently just sat around after being dropped off. Idiots.

Two Jenners, a Hatchetman (that got focus-fired to death right away.)

Zuranna meant, if you were going to run up right next to her with your back turned...

The last mech was a hapless Locust 1M, picked off with a single shot.

No salvage to speak of, just bits and pieces.

Zuranna increased her piloting to 8; Luximai her gunnery to 6 and Lana her tactics to 8, and got Master Tactician.

Next was a 2-skull Titan Attack. Natasha took the Decapitator, and Zuranna swapped to the Bull Shark.

Hah! Two assault mechs. Oh, the paladins were shaking.

The first mech into sight - a Spider - actually took a bit of killing, due to the lance's not great gunnery and its high evasion. But it wouldn't be spotting for the 45 and 75 tonner behind it. (Wait, 75 tons wasn't an assault mech!)

Hatchetman and an Orion. Funny assault mech; though TECHNICALLY Orions were originally assault mechs, Zuranna mused as she made her first shot at its head (from outside ER Laser range).

The Decapitator, just with a normal shot, triggered the Hatchetman's ammo and took it out via pilot kill.

Luximai headcapped the Orion.

The other assault mech turned out to be a BattleMaster, which Zuranna promptly blew the head off - though it came from an odd angle and the one salvo it got off (as it appeared without being located on sensors - nearly destroyed one of the buildings.

OH. And the other side of the reinforcement lance WAS another assault mech - a Stalker.

The lance failed to kill it with their first salvo, but inexplicably, despite this being a polar environment, it fired but a single large laser at Natasha and missed.

The lance almost entirely missed its head, and Llana killed it via CT destruction.

That was neat - three parts BattleMaster and one part to finish a Hatchetman and a Stalker!

Luximai increased her gunnery to 7 and Lana upped her guts to 5 and took Bulwark.

Next up, a 3-skull clash of titans verses the Taurians and... Whoever else. Same line up, it seemed to be working...

Ah, the other side was the local government, not that it mattered...

The Taurian lance was a Wolverine, UrbanMech and... Demolisher? Was there an assault mech hiding around or was this a cheap rip-off again?

The lance destroyed the UrbanMech and Demolisher before they knew what hit them. The Wolverine followed shortly thereafter. Meanwhile, the apparent (possible?) assault mech was already fighting the government forces.

Two, a Commando and an damaged Vulcan, came to fight the lance.

Pfft, no, once Zuranna and Luximai moved closer, it was a 95-ton mech (the government assault one), plus a Locust verses a 55-ton mech.

The commando and Vulcan went down in short order, unsurprisingly.

For some inexplicable reason, the 55-tonner (a Griffin) decided that what it really needed to do was instead of taking on a 95-ton mech by itself was attack a 75, 90, 95 and 80 ton by itself AS WELL.

Zuranna took pity on it, walking forward and headcapping the inevitable Banshee.

Luximai was not as kind.

The Locust was swatted by the Thumper cannon.

Enough salvage to complete a Banshee, Griffin and Locust. Be great when the paladins reached a place they could SELL some of this stuff...!

Natasha raised her piloting to 9.

Last mission in this system a 3-skull destroy base verses the Taurians.

Llana swapped into the Decapitator, and Natasha replaced the Awesome with the Ballista.

This was another "base at the top of a hill with no approach" location.

A Warhammer was the first to run into the lance, followed by a Catapult and Hatchetman.

The Warhammer was knocked down and decapitated in short order.

The Catapult and Hatchetman lasted a little longer, before the former was destroyed by a rear Thumper cannon shot - the two daftly stood next to each other - and the Hatchetman went down to LRMs as it limped out of that.

Just the turrets and buildings to mop-up.

Enough salvage for a Warhammer.

Zuranna maxed her guts. Luximai's gunnery continued to creep up, going to 8. With delight, Llana hit tactics 9, so she could start taking called shots properly too!

And as Lynessa starts to work out where to go next, we will leave her for today.