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Dec 1, 2017 21:39
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| # ? Apr 27, 2024 05:52 |
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Exterminate. Exterminate.
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Dec 1, 2017 22:07
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The heavy hitters are about to enter the system, perhaps it would be better to disengage and wait for them? No need to take a battle unnecessarily.
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Dec 1, 2017 22:08
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Morrow posted:The heavy hitters are about to enter the system, perhaps it would be better to disengage and wait for them? No need to take a battle unnecessarily. Are we not better to get hits in while they can't evade/fire back? The heavy hitters are a bit away and the crabs can outpace us.
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Dec 1, 2017 22:14
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chippocrates posted:Are we not better to get hits in while they can't evade/fire back? The heavy hitters are a bit away and the crabs can outpace us. This chip knows what he's talking about.
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Dec 1, 2017 22:29
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chippocrates posted:Are we not better to get hits in while they can't evade/fire back? The heavy hitters are a bit away and the crabs can outpace us. They are too far away for that to work. Jump blindness doesn't hinder evasion and since they landed off the JP that means they did a combat jump so their sensors+firecontrol will be online in under a minute (way before the fleet can get in range) Morrow posted:The heavy hitters are about to enter the system, perhaps it would be better to disengage and wait for them? No need to take a battle unnecessarily. There are no relevant decisions here besides "try and scout The Fortress while hoping their berserk aggression means they don't have anything else waiting on the other side?"
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Dec 1, 2017 22:37
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silentsnack posted:They are too far away for that to work. Jump blindness doesn't hinder evasion and since they landed off the JP that means they did a combat jump so their sensors+firecontrol will be online in under a minute (way before the fleet can get in range) Jump blindness does mess with ECM, though.
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Dec 1, 2017 22:48
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silentsnack posted:There are no relevant decisions here besides "try and scout The Fortress while hoping their berserk aggression means they don't have anything else waiting on the other side?" Haha, I love this. If they have nothing on the other side do we then do the comedy thing of jumping back and forth every time they chase us?
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Dec 1, 2017 23:13
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So, are we going to be outfitting more microwave weaponry in order to cut out the middleman of cooking our celebratory dinners?
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Dec 1, 2017 23:18
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silentsnack posted:They are too far away for that to work. Jump blindness doesn't hinder evasion and since they landed off the JP that means they did a combat jump so their sensors+firecontrol will be online in under a minute (way before the fleet can get in range) The cruiser's lasers are in range now. Only the cruiser microwaves are out of range. ... Come to think of it, if we have any carriers on site, beam armed interceptors might be able to close to point blank before jump blindness wears off. They're pretty close.
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Dec 1, 2017 23:38
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Anta posted:Haha, I love this. If they have nothing on the other side do we then do the comedy thing of jumping back and forth every time they chase us? And going progressively more insane in the process. I'd tend to agree if they're close we really need to just gank the fuckers as soon as possible because they can likely outpace us and we might get a few hits in before they can fire back.
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Dec 1, 2017 23:39
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Crazyeyes24 posted:So, are we going to be outfitting more microwave weaponry in order to cut out the middleman of cooking our celebratory dinners? I do enjoy a TV dinner now and then.
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Dec 2, 2017 00:02
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Well they do come pre-packaged in single serving containers...
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Dec 2, 2017 00:14
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How good are our chances to win this fight? Worse or better than last time?
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Dec 2, 2017 00:36
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If we want help, our only option here is to send a ship to Nova Sol to ask Terra for help, right? All of our nebula-capable craft are already in system. I'm also wondering why the pit aliens didn't send these AND the shiva after us at once, especially if The Fortress is heavily guarded. Maybe the defenses are stationary or something. Or maybe we did just get really lucky like Sauros commented on in our update haha.
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Dec 2, 2017 00:45
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 15 Jan, 0130hrs  Hostile Transit!  First and Second Cruiser squadrons come about and sprint towards the enemy at 4300kps to engage before they can get their sensors and defensive ECM online.  GoonSpeed spacers! In a system not that far away:  The Dreadnoughts approach the Sol - Ranginui Jump point, at 4000kps they are 3 days 10 hours from the Ranginui - Pit jump point. Back in the Pit  The enemy has appeared within laser range but the nebula and distance means targeting is hard.  The fleet comes about and burns hard for the enemy. Gen. Tythas orders the Fleet scout Poke it with a stick and the survey ship to run in the direction of the unknown Jump point to lead the aliens away from Martian territory.  The first salvo goes out at long range but all misses.  Ten seconds later the Alien vessels dramatically increase their thermal signature and incredibly powerful ECM suites start up.   By now the range is down to 138k km from 204k km and the firsts hits connect. Still no response from the Alien vessels.  The range closes further and another salvo hits harder as the lasers deliver more power at the closer range.   50k km and the Aliens are yet to react. Suddenly the Alien vessels come about with incredible rapidity considering their size and align facing directly towards the We are not friends captained by Col. Kommando.  The fronts of the three Rakshasa glow ominously and Col. Kommando orders a hard right turn as the four Pollux class bring their main spinal lasers to bear at very close range.  The Martians fire first, the four massive lasers reaching out and... missing. It seems the famed luck of Triton fleet has run out. Sixty massive railgun lines arranged along the flanks of the Rakshasa fire as one and each ship also belches forth a truly stupendous plasma lance. The Rakshesha class does not fire anything.   We are not friends simply disintegrates under the enormous barrage with only a fraction of the crew making it to lifepods.  Col. Kommando Dismay fills the Martians as they realise just how badly they are outgunned.   Morale significantly improves when five seconds later a rapid fire laser finds a hole in the armor of the first Rakshasa and her powerful ECM splutters out.  Leaving the tumbling wreck of the Martian cruiser behind the combatants speed on, the Pit aliens holding the range at 50k km.  Martian Microwave cannons do their work and the active sensor of the third Rakshasa burns up.  Thirty seconds after their first salvo the Aliens fire again, this time with only the railguns. They are splitting their fire between three ships this time!  Nuclear apology suffers an unlucky hit that penetrates her armor and destroys an engine and she begins to fall behind.  Iron Duke has her armor torn apart and suffers non-critical internal damage while Missile Magnet takes the hits without any serious penetrations but there are worrying gaps in her armor. Realising they are a liablity the crews of the two missile cruisers quickly begin ejecting their ordnance to prevent any devastating explosions.   The response from the Martians is quite satisfying as the Rakshasa belches gas from another hole in her armor.  The aliens accelerate to a remarkable 6930kps and begin to open the range.  Laser damage falls off as the distance increases.  Unfortunately 30 seconds has passed and the Aliens fire their railguns again at the same targets.  Iron Duke staggers and falls out of formation.  Missile Magnet loses much of her armor and one of her three gauss cannons. Nuclear Apology is surprisingly okay, in a minor miracle taking all the impacts on her armor.   The range continues to extend and the microwaves are now unable to reach the hostiles.  With things looking grim for the task force SS It seemed like a good idea at the time radio's she is making maximum speed to rescue the survivors of We are not friends and will try to lose the Aliens in the Nebula.  Suddenly the Aliens come about and make directly for the cruisers.  The Pollux captains sweat profusely gripping the triggers for the main cannons.  The Rakshasa swing about at 30k km and hold the range....  I can't believe how lucky you a-holes are.   Pow, zap! You rake the Rakshasa with your small lasers.  In return they sling another sixty railgun shots at Warspite. She comes apart under the hailstorm of relativistic metal. Col BwenGun As Warspite dies her and her sister ships throw one final salvo.     ... ouch.  The Rakshasa reels, plasma spewing from a burning engine pod and she slows drastically.  Her compatriots burn hard and rapidly leave her behind.  Rapid fire lasers carve into her and her emissions fall off a cliff. No more targeting LIDAR or Active pulses come off her.  What was assumed to be a tumbling piece of debris suddenly ignites engines and heads at 12500kps for the damaged Iron Duke.  The fleet fires upon the Naga assault shuttle but it skillfully evades and before they can recharge is discharging exosuited aliens all over the slowed Iron Duke.  Here we go again, initial reports indicate over seventy boarders landing in good order.  The Naga speeds away and the fleet writhes as long range railgun shots pelt the Sucker Punch. No serious damage however.  The Good Idea picks up the We are not friends lifepods and turns to run on a nonspecific vector.  The three undamaged alien ships pass out of range while the cruisers are slowly overhauling the other. It has not fired in some time and is only making 3554kps. The weirdness with the speed displays is still present so the cruisers are actually making 4300kps.  Throughout the system most Martian assets are retreating for the Ranginui jump point. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------  Sucker Punch   Missile Magnet   Nuclear Apology   Iron Duke  The remaining combat capable cruisers. Nuclear Apology and Iron Duke are slowed and detached to their own task forces. Saros fucked around with this message at 02:07 on Dec 2, 2017 |
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Dec 2, 2017 01:06
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I Survived! This is obviously because nothing aside from Missiles can kill the Missile Magnet! Side note: God I hope this is an appreciable force for the FartKrabz, as if these are their patrol craft..... 
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Dec 2, 2017 01:12
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you brave Martians!
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Dec 2, 2017 01:13
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Dec 2, 2017 01:13
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Okay yeah when I saw the results in the Discord I thought the situation might be tenable but now I'm looking at those damage readouts and I can safely say there's no way in hell we can hold the Pit at this point. Kill that last fartcrab ship, then it's time to loving go.
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Dec 2, 2017 01:15
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Triton fleet won't one shot everything, but it will still endure.
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Dec 2, 2017 01:16
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Let's set some realistic expectations here; every ship in this vicinity is already dead. We cannot outrun them and we cannot outgun them unless they make a mistake We can take that cripple with us and we can prepare to self-district the Pollux class ship "Iron Duke", if needed. If we're lucky we get some ships out alive but it all depends how much The Pit aliens want combat. At least our microwaves should prevent them closing in for a quick kill. If they make that mistake then we might just burn out all their active sensors
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Dec 2, 2017 01:25
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Told you fuckers not to try holding this side of the jump point, told you they could drop things on top of us and we wouldn't have any significant advantage for being on the JP. My previous suggestion stands. Either get out of the pit, or form everything up and push through that jump point. No half measures, we can not blockade this system. Given the state of our forces I would strongly suggest the former.
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Dec 2, 2017 01:26
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TheWetFish posted:Let's set some realistic expectations here; every ship in this vicinity is already dead. We cannot outrun them and we cannot outgun them unless they make a mistake How big a chunk of our forces is this?
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Dec 2, 2017 01:33
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TheWetFish posted:We can take that cripple with us and we can prepare to self-district the Pollux class ship "Iron Duke", if needed. If we're lucky we get some ships out alive but it all depends how much The Pit aliens want combat. At least our microwaves should prevent them closing in for a quick kill. If they make that mistake then we might just burn out all their active sensors MFN Iron Duke is a Taiaha and just jettisoned all her missiles to avoid blowing up, we die in glory, but we die with our red claws and teeth wrapped firmly around a delicious fartcrab.
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Dec 2, 2017 01:34
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Dr. Snark posted:Okay yeah when I saw the results in the Discord I thought the situation might be tenable but now I'm looking at those damage readouts and I can safely say there's no way in hell we can hold the Pit at this point. Kill that last fartcrab ship, then it's time to loving go. I think it entirely depends on whether these aliens have morale we can break. Fights are not just about mechanics, they're just as much about morale. If these things aren't mindless automatons, they might feel they're losing and want to GTFO. Or even that they're winning but that it's getting too expensive. I don't think we can win if they commit to a fight, but we might make it a very expensive victory for them. It's an interesting thing about these fights in the nebula. Every time, we have gone all in, win or die, because we know we can't get away (and well, +/- fanatics). They on the other hand, can get away, with their faster ships, so they have the option of withdrawing. We don't, so we are forced to be aggressive. We're a cornered animal, while they still can have thoughts of surviving and getting home, which means that if they're actually fleeing now, that makes perfect sense. That is, if they're fleeing. If the fight continues, we won't have much of our cruiser squadrons left.
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Dec 2, 2017 01:43
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TheWetFish posted:Let's set some realistic expectations here; every ship in this vicinity is already dead. We cannot outrun them and we cannot outgun them unless they make a mistake Not necessarily. We really don't know if the crabs have any more ships at us in the next few hours/days, and the Nova Sol JP is much closer to those ships than the Ranginui one. If they kill the one ship and go there right now they have a shot at surviving this mess. Anta posted:I think it entirely depends on whether these aliens have morale we can break. Thing is though we don't know if they're fleeing because they've lost or if they're just biding time and trying to hold out for reinforcements. With the amount of ships sent through (1 Shiva, 3 Rakshasa-As, 1 Rakshasa-B since Intel didn't give them separate classifications) it's now safe to say we're not dealing with some remnant species but rather an active and hostile threat with an unknown industrial capacity and technology level. Staying in the Pit is now officially suicide, the dreads are too far out, and our remaining ships are only barely holding together. It's time to pull the gently caress out.
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Dec 2, 2017 01:47
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Well we had a good run, humanity.
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Dec 2, 2017 01:48
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Synthbuttrange posted:Well we had a good run, humanity. ...What? No, we're fine. We can confirm that we can win against these alien bastards and we've got much better ships ready to hold the line.
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Dec 2, 2017 01:52
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sebmojo posted:How big a chunk of our forces is this? I think it's a fair bit right now. The Pollux's are disproportionately valuable in the nebula. We've got some of our other heavy hitters incoming (days) but in terms of things like raw numbers of 45cm spinals it's quite a lot
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Dec 2, 2017 01:53
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That was pretty bad. Lost over half our forces for not really 1/3 of theirs. Our big spinals and their plasma cannon make the fights pretty swingy so we can still do some serious damage if we get lucky, but the odds are very much against us now. I'm inclined to roll the dice anyways. I really want that salvage. Also, those are some fairly nice railguns. 60 shots from 3 ships means 20 per ship so either 4 or 5 shots per volley seems likely. Probably 5 given how fast they are and that they also carry a large plasma cannon. Shivan railguns have a cycle time of 30 seconds. LLSix fucked around with this message at 02:01 on Dec 2, 2017 |
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Dec 2, 2017 01:55
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 15 Jan, 0133hrs  The Nuclear Apology picks up the survivors of the Warspite and makes for waypoint 2, set to be away from the rest of the exploration fleet as it withdraws.  The crews of the cruisers jeer as the crippled Rakshasa dodges desperately but their lasers still find it.  Their cheer suddenly loses its fervor when the three undamaged ships suddenly correct course and accelerate to 6930kps. At the same time the damaged RAkshasa begins emitting the low rumbling pulse now familiar to the Martian crews.  Their heading... is directly for the SS Farseeker who has just returned from Nova Sol in a flare of jump radiation and exotic particles. At 6930kps they are forty-seven hours from the Nova Sol jump point and there is nothing in the Martian fleet that can catch them.  The damaged Rakshasa suddenly disappears in a massive flare of light, afterwards there is nothing but a tumbling shell gutted by plasma fires. No fire was directed her way at that moment and the explosion appears to have originated internally. SS Farseeker has seen the explosions and weapons flares and has wisely gone into maximum emissions control. A whisker thin comms laser finds the DD Azreal off the third comet. Farseeker reports she was temporarily detained by Terran forces before being released and has returned with the news of a Terran force awaiting beyond the Jump Point. Command suddenly becomes fully aware of the situation unfolding before them. The Alien ships are heading directly for a jump point that links to Terra's primary outsystem colony.  I need proposals put forward for what to tell Terra, if anything.
Saros fucked around with this message at 02:03 on Dec 2, 2017 |
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Dec 2, 2017 01:59
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Disaster? I thought we did this on purpose.
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Dec 2, 2017 02:01
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oh no the fartcrabs are going to try and hurt the terrans someone should do something and by something i mean point and laugh as they get rekt Seriously though this is now officially Not Our Problem. We did our best to kill those crabs and now there's nothing we can do to stop them. The ball's in Terra's court now.
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Dec 2, 2017 02:02
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mossyfisk posted:Disaster? I thought we did this on purpose. Technically they tried to decoy them towards a jump point they at the time did not know lead to a Terran system. Now you do.
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Dec 2, 2017 02:03
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Abandon the Pit. Assemble the FIRST UNITED HUMAN KILL FLEET with the Earthicans. THEN GO HUNT SOME CRAB!
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Dec 2, 2017 02:06
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saros posted:The fleet comes about and burns hard for the enemy. Gen. Tythas orders the Fleet scout Poke it with a stick and the survey ship to run in the direction of the Nova Sol Jump point to lead the aliens away from Martian territory I am a very villainous man. I am also very surprised my ship took no damage during that encounter
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Dec 2, 2017 02:06
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1) An unknown extrasolar force has attacked our ships multiple times in the Pit system. 2) They are moving towards the transit point to Nova Sol. 3) In every engagement they have fired first and made no attempt at communication.
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Dec 2, 2017 02:07
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Welp. Salvage operations in The Pit might be able to continue for a bit longer  Inform United Terra to prepare their gate camp, do not wait on ID for fire authority. Find out if there's anything else they want to do. Probably start mustering forces in Sol just in case and have everything closer to The Pit start a pursuit through to Terra Nova. We can't catch them but we might have some cleanup to do after the missiles start flying
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Dec 2, 2017 02:07
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| # ? Apr 27, 2024 05:52 |
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Jump sickness be damned, send the SS Farseeker back through immediately to warn the Terrans and provide an ETA. Provide full combat data of the enemy ships to UT, repackaged so as not to include Martian tech of course. Advise them to stand back from the JP and engage with missiles as the hostiles seem to have a primarily beam armament. Warn them about the Naga boarding shuttles. Inform that we killed one of the 3 combat ships before the enemy used their speed advantage to disengage. e.g. pass along best guess at armor layers, max speed, armament ranges, Jump Radius, etc.
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Dec 2, 2017 02:07
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