Blood in the Water OOC Thread, Cyberpirates: Chatter here! Options

[Penta]

That'll teach you not to count dead anything I run til I officially call it and draw up the death certificate.(IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif) Damn things may stay on life support for ages, but they tend not to die without me doing something to kill it.

[SleepIncarnate]

Alright, for myself and the 3 other new players (BetaFlame, ntwi, and Inane Imp), rather than have penta try and do all of this interaction with us one at a time via PM, I've set up an IC thread for just us until the main team gets back to some kind of dock. It'll make things easier on penta, and allows us to get some In Character interactions going as well. The link is here:

http://forums.dumpshock.com/index.php?showtopic=29633

I've compiled 4 posts there already for us, the first being the standard IC posting rules from the start of that thread, plus the post a few pages in where penta introduced us to all the instructors. Third, I've added the message he sent us all individually, and finally the post from this thread he linked us to in the message, discussing all the positions on the ship. As I listed there, I'll wait until tomorrow to do my own IC bit, I just got home from a long day, want to have some dinner and play some Mass Effect 2 before going to bed shortly, so have at it.

[Penta]

I applaud SI's initiative - I may post something up there before she does, but anyway.

Yes, temp thread for the newbies is a good idea. I initially intended to handle it totally off-camera, without RP, but this is actually a better idea.

[BetaFlame]

I'll be posting something tomorrow.

I got a beating at work today. Sales job in a call center. High stress.

[Penta]

I knew I forgot something.

I talked with Whizbang today. He'll be back with us eventually, just has RL issues (including a broken computer) to get through.

So all we're waiting on is Marwynn.

[Inane Imp]

Doh, serves me right for replying to the PM without checking the OOC thread. Penta ignore my quick and dirty PM about the training (although if you spot any significant problems let me know); I'll cover it in the IC thread.

Edit: quick question. We're getting the same set of instructors as the old hands?

[ntwi]

(IMG:style_emoticons/default/nyahnyah.gif) People with initiative. Fine, make me rewrite what I had typed out while at work. I'm looking forward to it though, I had been hoping for the chance to interact with the other new characters but hadn't thought about creating a new thread.

[Inane Imp]

A word about speeds

Please note: The max speed of your ship, without redlining, is 14 knots. (Fortunately for you, most freighters top out at 12 knots!) Cruising speed (which is what I calculate fuel consumption off of) is about 12 knots (80% of top speed), and if you go faster, you drink more fuel. You can go up to 120% of top speed if you redline the engine, but if you redline, you will almost certainly damage the engines.
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These numbers are temporary until I can do the math to convert the "Speed" listing of the H&W Classique III (you'll recall that that ship's our stat base for the yacht) into knots (a knot, for reference, is 1 nautical mile per hour). No karma if you do it for me, just a thanks.

Vote for adjusting the temporary numbers.

1 nautical mile, is (without going into cartography) 10 cables, each cable is 200 yds. 1 metre is 0.91? yards, 1 nm is 1.852 Kms.

Speed in knots = Max speed in m/combat turn * 20 * 60 / 1000/1.852
Vessel speed = 35 * 20 * 60 / 1000/1.852 = 22.68 Kn

Crest speed = 51.8 Kn. Which is about right for a high-speed jetboat, ridiculously fast for a ship's boat when weighed down with an angry and heavily armed boarding party. (30 Kn is probably a good ballpark figure).

This is important because in a stern chase with a merchant vessel (12 Kn ) that spots you on the horizon (12 nm+, it depends on the height of the radar set, the size of the object and atmospherics - you guys did buy an atmospheric sensor for the ship, right? (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif) , of note visual horizon is almost always less than radar ) it will take you 6 hours to overhall it at 14 Kn. Which is more than enough time for an Azzie air patrol to catch up with you and give you a bad day (one must assume that since half of all ocean-born traffic bound for Aztlan passes through the Caribbean they are patrolling heavily). At 22 Kn that same solution takes you 72 mins.

I'd leave cruising speed at 12 knots though.

On that note, can my character skip his Navigation lessons. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)

Also, what hull did we design the ship's Zod off? I can't work out its stats?

Edit: Ooops, I copied my formulars accross wrong. They're good now.

[ntwi]

I believe the stats for the Zodiac were created from the general dataset of vessels and ships, rather than modifications of a specific vessel. They seem like reasonable numbers to me for the style of boat it is.

While I agree with your ~22 knot speed for the yacht, I would tend to place the cruising speed a little bit higher than ~12, although we are talking about a 50m yacht here. 30-35 knots seems like a reasonable speed for the zodiacs though, even when fully loaded. Your numbers in regards to a stern chase situation don't bother me, as if a vessel turns tail and runs the first time it see's an unknown blip on radar, it's never going to get anywhere. If they see a yacht anchored near a remote island with a inflatable zodiac nearby and a dive flag up, I don't think it would raise too many questions. I think the key to our operations will be gaining the intel to be waiting for the vessel before it arrives. (There are so many more options when you ambush someone)

That being said, one of the drones we should look into acquiring is one of the "Stormcloud" line. A small balloon hovering 1km or so up will not have much of a radar signature, and yet even passive sensors up that high can give us far more information than shipboard ones. Put innocent active sensors on it, like a doppler radar for weather (and ships) and it will give us that eye in sky for early warning.

[Inane Imp]

Actually a Stormcloud sucks for nautical work. Stormclouds have a max speed of 16.2 Kn. Google reveals that the average wind velocity in the Caribbean is usually above 10 Kn. Which means that into the wind they can only make good 6 kn on an average day (for a lot of the year they're going to have difficulty just maintaining station). This effectively ties your movement to the wind whilst you've got it up. Compare a rotordrone (64 Kn) or a Dalmatian (78 Kn): both can have the same sensors but arn't reliant on the wind.

The downside is that they have less time in the air (or you soak up valuable resources to do it); you can counter that by having them scouting along your planned track, focussing them on where your likely to spot incoming targets (at 20 Kn a ship catching up from abaft the beam has to be going very fast to close you at any speed). If you get two and your willing to work your crew hard, you can set it up to have 1 in the air at all times. Especially since if all your doing with them is recon you don't need a dedicated rigger looking after them: a decent command program will be more than enough.

If you really wanted a Stormcloud though, you could fit a Winch to your ship and tether it. That would work.

The place Stormclouds would be useful is sitting off the coast whilst your waiting for a ship to depart (or arrive). In this scenario your not overly concerned about your rate of progress more about simply having an asset in the right place over a long period of time.

Tl;dr - Stormclouds good for static recon; VTOL drones good for mobile recon.

[CollateralDynamo]

Wow, the new kids are doing calculations we never even wanted to think about. I guess once we have handled all the nitty gtritty stuff like survival gear, they can worry about wind-speed velocity and the differences between nautical miles and knots. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/nyahnyah.gif)

You kids keep at it, I just hope you don't have problems following COMMANDS!

[Inane Imp]

You want, I can tell you the basic formular for working out the horizon of a radar set. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/nyahnyah.gif)

[SleepIncarnate]

Wow, the new kids are doing calculations we never even wanted to think about. I guess once we have handled all the nitty gtritty stuff like survival gear, they can worry about wind-speed velocity and the differences between nautical miles and knots. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/nyahnyah.gif)

You kids keep at it, I just hope you don't have problems following COMMANDS!

I'm a runner, of course I have problems following commands.

[SleepIncarnate]

IN regards to the Assensing in IC, rolled 6 dice got 1 hit. Used the dice roller you find the link to from here: http://www.tlucretius.net/Shadowrun/sr4/Links.html Don't have physical dice with me while I'm home for the next few days so will hafta use it, and sadly it just lists number of hits rather than the roll, so, yeah. Shoulda brought dice. Ah well.

[ntwi]

With a sleep regulator, I’m going to guess that they will cut his sleep time from 4 hours to 2 hours, giving him 17 hours of training per day. I’m also making the guess that the position training hours are per day while the common course and elective hours are one time shots.

17 hours per day
Daily Courses:
3 hours Marine Officer
4 hours Navigation Officer (Not the full course but a specialized variant dealing with underwater, quiet (no active sensors, passive only) and/or tactical navigation.

10 hours remaining per day for 7 days = 70 hours

Common Core: 25 hours
2hr Basic Military
4hr Damage Control
4hr Firearm Care (Trying to find a simple/cheap way to transport/carry weapons underwater and shoot them without problems out of the water afterwards [according to the rules there are no problems, but it’s something that I see Nemo doing])
2hr Intro to Carib
2hr First Aid
4hr Magic for Mundanes
2hr Watch standing
4hr Psychological Wellbeing
1hr Flag Recognition

Electives: 46 hours for the following.
4 Ship Combat
8 Drone usage
4 Sabotage
6 Explosives Sabotage

4 Pilot
4 PoliSci
4 Flora and Fauna
6 Spanish
6 Portuguese



As long as the plan is solid, Nemo will have no problems executing it in a professional and military fashion. And hey, I've got 0.225 essence left, there is still man in there somewhere (IMG:style_emoticons/default/nyahnyah.gif) Stinkin magic users and their "purity of soul"

[Inane Imp]

You can get Invisible castle to show the dice rolls themselves.

4 hours Navigation Officer (Not the full course but a specialized variant dealing with underwater, quiet (no active sensors, passive only) and/or tactical navigation.

My understanding was that the Nav Officer training was Nautical Navigation: how to navigate a ship, Rules-of-the-Road, chartwork, astro-nav, GPS theory, relative velocity, tide theory, basic meteorology etc. Underwater Nav - as I understand it - would be covered in Advanced SCUBA (although one assumes your using UCAS Diver's BA sets, so rebreathers and min-magnetic rather than the loud, mainly metal and lots of bubbles civilian SCUBA sets).

My timetable.
0030-0600 Sleep
0600-0700 Morning PT (7 hrs total)
0700-0800 3S's and B'fast
0800-1200 Forenoon Classes
1200-1230 Lunch
1230-1530 Afternoon Classes
1530-1630 Self Defence Training (7 hrs total)
1630-1930 Dogs Watch Engineering Training (21 Hrs total)
1930-2000 Dinner
2000-2359 First Watch Classes
0001-0030 End of day routine

This is based on the assumption that while you may be able to push people that hard with 4 hours sleep for 4 days and expect them to retain anything you tell them, you absolutely cannot do that over 7 days. By about day 5 they're zombies, who won't retain anything for more than the time it takes to pass the exam (thats if they're awake during the exam).

15 hours remaining per day for 7 days = 105 hours

Common Core: 27 hours
2hr Basic Military
4hr Damage Control
4hr Markmanship
2hr Firearm Care
2hr Intro to Carib (Oh yes, this will be fun)
8hr First Aid
4hr Magic for Mundanes
4hr Psychological Wellbeing (this one is going to be less focussed on life at sea and more on 'inner demons' I think.)
1hr Watch standing / Flag Recognition (I'm assuming he sits a test and then thats over and done with)

Role: 45 hr
8hr Navigation Officer (Converting his merchant nav skills to naval nav skills, so assuming half time for this course)
21hr Engineering Officer
8hr Boats Officer (Throwing the same type of Zod as the ship has around the Chesapeake, pulling its engine apart etc)
8hr Marine Ops (He sits in on this more because he needs to understand what they're doing, to support them as much as he is able)

Electives: 33 hours for the following.
4hr In-Ship combat tactics
2hr Piloting 101 (the Fedellah, ship handling theory is universal - this will give him familiarity with the system and how she behaves, nothing more)
8hr Piloting 101 (focus on Aerial Drones)
8hr Drone tactics
7hr Self-Defence

[Penta]

Guys:

As I promised, a bit more explanation from this morning...

My dad is in the hospital. They have no particular idea what the hell's wrong with him, but needless to say, I'm off my rhythm severely.

I'll look over the sheets tonight, that said.

[SleepIncarnate]

I'm finding the schedule Penta made for us fine for Yinglong, though some classes will be altered or not attended. As a mage, she won't be doing Magic for Mundanes, and instead of rifle training they'd focus more on small arms and maybe automatics for her. Military culture would be a breeze and just be Navy/Marine style. And I'll move us forward to the base in a bit, gonna give BetaFlame a chance to post before I do so.

[ntwi]

Using the handy dandy radar sensor to get an idea of the cyberware intalled on my comrades.


http://invisiblecastle.com/roller/view/2389378/


That gives me 1 hit which is enough to see standard cyberware, and guess what, I don't think there is any.... One Sam and three people with no cyberware, he feels a tad out of place.

[BetaFlame]

I'll be posting this evening. Sorry, work called me in for OT yesterday, and my mother in law is in town too.

Penta, I hope things work out okay for you :\

[Penta]

So far as my dad goes:

He's okay, he's in good spirits..they just have absolutely no clue what's wrong with him.

So far as game goes:

The sheets look okay.

I'll update the newbiethread after everybody's posted...And the main thread once people actually post...

[BetaFlame]

I wasn't sure exactly how much time we would have, and I did my schedule ICly, if you need something more exact, I can do that too.

0030-0515: Sleeptime
0530-0630: PT
0630-0700: Breakfast (Is there Haggis?)
0700-1130: Morning Classes (Starting as Basic Military, will move to Marksmanship, then Firearm Care, Flag recognition.)
1200-1230: Lunch
1230-1300: Powernap
1300-1730: Afternoon Classes (I'll do my swim test on the first day, then take Intro to Carib, then Watchstanding on the following days. After watchstanding, )
1730-1800: Dinner
1800-1830: Evening Classes (Classes with Estaban. Hopefully for the duration of the stay. I know little of Voodoo, and need a primer on Blood Magic to seperate what I learned from gossip)

[Penta]

A half hour is too short for evening classes. Basically, the class periods are blocks - they can release you early from a class, but more likely they'll just push on into more detailed stuff.

I'd prefer something more exact for my OOC consultation. Otherwise, see my IC response.

[BetaFlame]

I think I actually mistyped the time, since I was looking at the dinner notes at the sametime. It should be 1800-2130. Same three hour block.

[BetaFlame]

I have the sudden urge to summon a spirit with the Movement power to complete the 2KM run in about a minute and a half.

If I didnt think I would get shot.