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Post by hornet on Feb 4, 2012 16:06:53 GMT
OK, so... I'm just going to leave this here: Aaaaaaand this: I'll be back for them later, m'kay? M'kay.
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Post by Mr Bismarck's Electric Donkey on Feb 4, 2012 20:49:20 GMT
I'm going to need everyone to refer to me as Splashdog going forward.
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Post by hornet on Feb 4, 2012 23:22:08 GMT
THE TIME?
1967.
THE PLACE?
Vietnam.
THE AIR FORCE?
Er... the United States one?
THE MISSION?
Making stuff that is currently there not be there any more.
THE SQUADRON?
Divot.
THE COMMANDER?
Borderline incompetent.
Oh yes.
The Rolling Thunder air offensive was based on the idea of "gradualism". Lesser targets were attacked whule holding more important targets "hostage" against attack to bring North Vietnam to the negotiating table. OR SO IT SAYS HERE.
And what better unit to engage in gradualism than Divot Squadron, a bunch of pilots who do things so gradually they probably won't even finish before getting bored and wandering off?
Join me, because why should Splashdog Stu get all the fun killing off virtual acquaintances via a solitaire board game simulating historical air war?
JOIN ME.
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Post by coffers on Feb 6, 2012 14:35:21 GMT
I'm in
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deej
Zebra Spider
Posts: 67
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Post by deej on Feb 7, 2012 9:24:08 GMT
Let's napalm us some gooks!
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Post by Sonic on Feb 7, 2012 11:48:42 GMT
Goggles primed.
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Post by Moo on Feb 7, 2012 14:50:49 GMT
I'm moist with anticipation.
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Post by coffers on Feb 7, 2012 14:56:48 GMT
That is not something I wish to think about.
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Post by Mr Bismarck's Electric Donkey on Feb 7, 2012 16:26:50 GMT
I'm moist with anticipation. Sorry. That was SPLASHDOG.
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Post by hornet on Feb 8, 2012 1:04:52 GMT
Phantom Leader (for it is he) is a game that simulates the air war in Vietnam. Each day you are assigned a target site which is (usually) protected by both ground defences and Vietnamese fighters. You then assign pilots to the mission, choose their weapons load and send them on their merry way to blow shit up for God and country. Easy! Except, not. Flying missions makes pilots stressed. If a pilot gets too stressed, his performance is impaired. If he gets even more stressed he's unable to fly any further missions until he's chilled the fuck out a bit. Also: flying missions also sometimes makes pilots dead. BUT LET US NOT SPEAK OF THAT. POPS is the squadron's only Veteran pilot. He's good at dogfighting, very good at hitting ground targets and is one of the four guys in the unit who's Fast - ie, he gets to attack before the enemy do. He's flying an F-4 Phantom which means he's got a wide choice of weapons and plenty of places to hang them off. He is, basically, the first name on the team sheet. STU and MEEJ are both Skilled. AND IN THE GAME. Stu's flying an F-4 and is an air-to-air specialist, so if friendly bombs need to rain on Hell's Elbow we're probably going to need to rely on the Spaiiad, who's our best thing-on-the-ground-blower-upper. Meej is flying the two-seater Wild Weasel variant of the F-105 Thunderchief which is the only plane in the game that can use the anti-radiation missiles which are designed to knock out surface-to-air missile sites. Rounding off the list of our Fast pilots is COFFS in the other Wild Weasel F-105. Coffs' nerves aren't what they used to be - if the Viet Cong so much as throw him a reproachful look he'll spend the next mission in the staff canteen drinking tea. DC (in a standard F-105 Thud) is similarly fragile but makes up for it by being a stronger all-round pilot than anyone in the squadron whose name doesn't rhyme with LopTexter. By contrast, ELTH knows no fear. He's got an F-4 Phantom, he's half-decent at dropping bombs and he gives exactly NO SHITS AT ALL. MOO and FUZZY are the last two Average combat pilots, both in F-4s, Fuzzy is an excellent air-to-ground gunner and crap at hitting planes, Moo's mediocre all round (AND IN THE GAME). Both are pretty dependable workhorses. BOONY is the first of our two Green pilots. He has an admirably Elthian attitude to personal danger and isn't bad at dogfighting but does have one tiny flaw - that he could drop bombs out of a rowing boat and miss the water. Dunno about you, but I'm seeing that as a drawback in a FUCKING GROUND ATTACK SQUADRON. On the other hand, SONIC is a perfectly acceptable ground attack pilot but a) he's flying an F-100 Super Sabre which has the same payload capacity as a medium-sized wheelbarrow and b) he's flaky to the point of complete neurosis. Honestly, he makes DC and Coffs look like Clint Eastwood in the last ten minutes of Unforgiven. Our single Newbie is DEEJ, who combines Sonic's laid-back sang-froid with Stevie Wonder's keen eye for the target. The best that can be said for Deej is that if I can get him and his F-4 out on a couple of missions without him COMPLETELY FREAKING OUT he should quickly level up to something approaching mediocrity. Finally, we've got FRUITS in the EB-66 Destroyer electronic warfare plane. The Destroyer doesn't carry weapons (so... it doesn't do a lot of destroying, then?) but it does make all our other planes in its area more difficult to hit, which is a potential lifesaver. Fruits is too flakey to be sent on every mission, but should be worth his weight in Tunnocks if he's tagging along when we're going after the tougher/more valuable targets. I don't know about the enemy, but you sure scare the hell out of me. AND IN THE GAME.
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Post by Sonic on Feb 8, 2012 11:37:41 GMT
Nice.
I noticed that Elth needs some Fibre, though it's your choice if it's the moral sort.
Horn, I hope your not saying that I'm a good diver. I imagine that's a bad quality in someone flying a plane...
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Post by Moo on Feb 8, 2012 12:51:48 GMT
Airplanes don't really interest me. AND IN THE GAME.
In related news, good luck. i think.
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Post by elth on Feb 8, 2012 13:09:37 GMT
I'm guessing my longevity in this is going to be the precise opposite of what I experienced in s1ut's game.
Good thing I look good in purple.
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Post by coffers on Feb 8, 2012 13:37:51 GMT
Pass the PG Tips, but only if you are completely out of Yorkshire Tea
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deej
Zebra Spider
Posts: 67
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Post by deej on Feb 9, 2012 9:15:25 GMT
I strive for the giddy heights of mediocrity.
Moo is my hero....
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Post by Moo on Feb 9, 2012 10:56:39 GMT
Well done, you're the 15th best pilot here.
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Post by Mr Bismarck's Electric Donkey on Feb 9, 2012 16:12:56 GMT
Bearing in mind my recent experiences with driving a plane look like this :
and like this :
You might not want to let me shoot anything down.
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Post by Sonic on Feb 10, 2012 10:39:40 GMT
Apparently I was pretty handy at the shooting thing.
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Post by hornet on Feb 16, 2012 10:28:35 GMT
Mission control. Plus: shoes.DAY ONE Divot Squadron is offered a choice of two targets, a supply depot and a radar installation. Both are a similar (annoyingly long) distance from base, they're offering the same number of victory points and are pretty similar in terms of defences, so I opt to go for the radar site on the grounds that it'll give me a chance to use ground-attack-savant Meej and his anti-radar missiles. I can send 6 planes on the mission, so the heavy lifting in terms of actually blowing up the target is going to be done by DC and Fuzzy, each carrying a pair of fricking enormous 2000lb Mk. 84 unguided bombs. Deej is along for the ride, loaded with 4 rocket pods which are excellent for knocking out SAM or AAA sites at a distance and which, at a pinch, could be used to finish the target off if one of the bombers misses / gets shot down / gets bored and wanders off. With 5 enemy aircraft over the target I decide to send two escorts loaded for air-to-air, which means that Splashdog Stu is up along with Boony, both carrying a pair of long-range radar-guided Sparrows and a couple of slightly unreliable Sidewinder heat-seeking dogfight missiles. Looking at the target, the plan is to come in low - which will take the surface-to-air missile sites out of the equation - from the south. Deej and Meej will rocket the fuck out of the anti-aircraft artilliery, with a priority being the horribly deadly (but short-ranged) Zu-23 in the target zone. We'll ignore the infantry and just take our chances that they won't make the 10 to 1 shot of damaging one of our aircraft and forcing it to abort the mission. NOTHING. CAN POSSIBLY. GO. WRONG.
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Post by elth on Feb 16, 2012 13:11:29 GMT
I'm even lazier in board games that I am in real life.
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Post by Mr Bismarck's Electric Donkey on Feb 16, 2012 14:19:36 GMT
Indeed. Thus far on this deployment you've done less than Hornet's shoes.
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Post by coffers on Feb 16, 2012 17:13:04 GMT
Pass me the tea.......
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Post by Sonic on Feb 17, 2012 11:08:38 GMT
There was a deployment?
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Post by Moo on Feb 17, 2012 11:10:12 GMT
Is this thing still going?
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deej
Zebra Spider
Posts: 67
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Post by deej on Feb 17, 2012 16:56:08 GMT
Obviously I shall do just enough to ensure that someone else gets shot up the pantfish and captured by the VC.
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