AUSTIN (Jesset City):
It has become increasingly clear that if Millennium Break is to have a future, we are going to need to exist beyond this terrible moon. This task has four major phases. Um, first we need to leave Partizan. We need to launch off the world using some sort of launch solution. Um, the credentials that Leap provided for us do open up one possibility, the use of the Barranca loop, which, uh, is as you know, in Apostolisean and territory. In fact, it is still operated by Apostolos.
[Music begins: TANAGER. PERFECT. TOUCHPAPER.]
AUSTIN:
Um, in fact, we also know that it was once operated by Motion, which I raise, because I don't think any of us are friends of hers. It would be dangerous. I'm not saying it wouldn't be. Um, however we get to space, stage two is, uh, I wouldn't say the easy part, but let's say the easiest part. Um, we would adjust our heading. We would burn some fuel and I believe we would simply kick back for a week as we drifted towards the portcullis. And then we jump through the gate, uh, and, and safely extract with the tools we need to build a base somewhere. Light work.
ALI:
Sylvie, your suggestion was that we launch from the Apostolos side, but when the Ori-Con ship is leaving?
SYLVIE:
Yeah. Like when they're launching all their stuff, cause it sounded like they were launching multiple ships. Right?
AUSTIN:
They’re launching a giant big ship with -- The answer is yes. The answer is yes, basically. Yes.
SYLVIE:
Something substantial that --
AUSTIN:
Yes.
SYLVIE:
Like security forces would be more focused on than one little ship.
ALI:
Yeah.
AUSTIN (traffic control):
Uh, vessel registered CC312 uh, come in. Are you prepared for inspection?
ALI:
Uh, yes, indeed. Hi. Hello.
AUSTIN (traffic control):
Hello. Hi.
AUSTIN (Inspector Nicol):
Uh, unit A2. Is there any cargo or any, are there any passengers on board that go against any of the regulations put in place by the Apostolisean transport act?
JANINE (Thisbe):
Unclear. If investigator Nicol could wait approximately 6.3 hours, I would be able to download the entirety of the act and confirm.
AUSTIN (Nicol):
“Okay. Uh-huh. Interesting. You're going to want to get this model, uh, checked whenever you get to your destination captain.” Then I look closer at Thisbe, um, but seemingly have forgotten the closet with the bad VIN number in it.
[Music ends]
AUSTIN:
Um, and then they leave. Um, and you're, you're kind of the whole ship kind of like, does that like stutter as you get kind of pulled, uh, forward, like jostled forward in place. Um, and you're getting ready to launch, um, you know, you'll be launching in a few minutes. I think everyone, you know, buckles up so to speak. I'm guessing the kind of big open area in the middle has a bunch of seats with like, Uh, seatbelts and kind of things that lock you in place.
ALI:
Uh, yeah. Yeah, yeah yeah yeah.
AUSTIN:
Or something like that.
ALI:
Yeah yeah yeah yeah.
AUSTIN:
Um, and the wind takes you, you know, um, the, the. You get this just incredible charge of energy underneath you, as you begin to lift up, um, your -- the ship is now like above the ground and it's going faster than you've ever felt it go before because the Maglev, you know, track is just super powerful.
It's empowered by both Motion and the Breath of the Exemplar. Um, and that's a lot of power. Um, and again, as it does this, there is like a reverberation inside of the ship that Milli you recognize as Motion's voice, just saying things to you. And again, I, I genuinely think it's not there's no, there is no, um, there's no meaning. There's no, no, there's no like cohesive anything.
It's just like manufacturer. Mathematics, you know, inhabit or whatever, you know,
SYLVIE:
It's like those stupid rings.
AUSTIN:
Wait, which rings.
SYLVIE:
The ones that Leap had.
AUSTIN:
Oh, It's like the stupid rings that Leap had. Yes, exactly. Um, and it's not anything because what it really is, is like, Whooovhehvheh. And, but your head is like, Oh yeah. Oh yeah, that was definitely Motion.
Just saying biography to me, you know, um, which is weird and puts you in a place I'm not giving you any more stress because now, you know, this is going to happen.
SYLVIE:
Yeah.
AUSTIN:
Um, and then you're on this, you're on this track now for it's like, The longest two minutes of your life. Um, as you, you take off very fast, uh, but also there's a point where you're like, is this working? Is this supposed to what's happening? Um, and then things start to lift like any loose cloth begins to lift into the air. Yeah. Um, hopefully you have everything put away, but like, you know, if you had, uh, uh, an Ash tray out on the table, I mean, one don't smoke in here. That would be very dangerous. But, uh, if you did, or a bottle or something, it lifts up off the ground.
And for the first time you see Partizan for the first time, um, I guess Milli, this is the first time where you, you weren't raised here either. No. None of you were raised here, right? You've all been in space before at some point.
SYLVIE:
Yeah. I don't think Milli’s been in space outside of like, like. More like, even more like brutalist, military ships,
AUSTIN:
Right. Right. Totally.
SYLVIE:
Like just like cargo containers, full of people, basically.
AUSTIN:
Yeah. Um, and, and one of the, one of the things that happens here, that's a one is you just see Partizan from above and you just see like the sea, uh, vast below you. And you can see, um, you know, where, where Cruciat is you can see where Auspice and Obell are. Um, you know, where the sands are. In fact, I, I think.
You know, you can, you can almost think about like, Oh wow. Is that crater from where Past came down that night, Broun and Thisbe. Or even for you Milli, like, Oh, right. We started here looking, this is, I'm looking down at Obell, where we went to that crash site where Past was destroyed. Um, and there it is. And it's all just like laid out in front of you, um, out the windows, the, the, um, you see the, uh, the constellation for the month that it is, um, which is.
It is the month of the Sphinx. Um, and so there's this giant Sphinx constellation made by artificial satellites. And you know, that this is not the one that people see from the ground. This is a second one that set up just for people leaving from the loop to see as they leave. Um, and then beyond that in the distance.
You see explosions as the Orion ship lifts off and gets into a fight with the other half of the kind of Orion loyalists crew. Uh, and you can see Apostolisean ships in the distance, kind of like guarding the kind of, uh, their kind of airspace border. Um, and it's like, as you're looking at that, that you feel the track beneath you give way to nothing.
And the Blue Channel takes to space and is in space for the first time. Uh, ever since you've had it at least. Um, and then like way off in the distance you're, you're, you know, navigational computer like outlines where the portcullis system is, and it's like so far away, you can't even see it, that you have to orbit around the planet, Girandole, which again is just massive in front of you. This beautiful gas, giant of blues and purples and pinks.
Um, uh, just like it's like looking at, uh, at it's like taking up most of one, whole half of your, of your view screen. Um, and you plot your course. Um, and you know, I kind of feel like, can give me a fortune roll to see how this just feels, Ali. I'm not going to, there's no like hard consequences for this, but this to me feels like a maneuver
ALI:
What's the fortune roll? 1D2?
AUSTIN:
1D6 is a fortune role is just, it's like a gather information. There's no hard consequence. It's just kind of like, um, or there's consequences, but there's a, okay, so with a two, uh, this was Rocky. Um, I think Jesset immediately pukes. Jesset has not been in space before.
This is miserable, Avar and, um, and Ryrira are also not pleased. Um, they are very upset, uh, uh, M’reb their, their toddler or their three-year-old. Now let's say, um, is crying. Um, uh, I said everybody on board. Am I forgetting anyone? I should look at my list of characters on board.
ALI:
There’s Si’dra and Eiden
AUSTIN:
Si’dra. Oh, I forgot about Eiden. Did Eiden come? Um, I didn't write Eiden down on my list. Yeah. Let's say Eiden Teak is here also from the Sable Court. Um, uh, it also here on board, uh, Eiden is fine. Eiden has been to the front lines even as a pro. Uh, Si’dra is holding it together. Uh, Si’dra is holding it together. Uh, but is putting in the effort to do such as what I would say.
Um, but you're in space, uh, and it's rocky and I want to like, stay on that communication of like, this is the, the way that space travel in this system or in this setting looks is, is kind of scary and rough. Um, you know, it's not luxurious. Um, uh, it's a little, um, overwhelming. Um, and we haven't even gotten to the part where you have to jump through a portcullis system, and that's just like a whole other stomach turning thing, even for pros.
ALI:
Mmmhmm.
AUSTIN:
Um, but yet you have week, you have a week in front of you, basically between now and when the next portcullis gate opening is. And that's about as long as, as it will take you to get there in a straight line. Um, What what's, what do you do as you, as you have downtime here, not downtime downtime, but you know, you're on the ship.
Um, Thisbe, are you now out of the cargo hold and like able to come upstairs and hang with people?
JANINE:
Um, probably, but to be honest, I bet Thisbe's really careful of that. Given the roughness, um, And the fact there’s like a baby up, like, it just, it just seems like if something went bad, it would, I think she's aware of that.
I think it's, it's sort of a situation of like, she probably comes up briefly and then goes back down and, you know.
AUSTIN:
Uh, so what else is happening on board? Who else has, how are folks passing this, this time, this week in space?
ALI:
Um, yeah, so I think Broun is, um, like trying to fill into the captain mode, but it's like tough to do that with people who know you already.
AUSTIN:
Right.
ALI:
Like it's a weird thing to like suddenly become an authority.
Um, but I think it's like a lot of check-ins, especially since it's like a bad. Rough ride. Um, I think they're doing the rounds of being like, Hey, do you need anything? Um, I think that they go downstairs to visit Thisbe every so often because Thisbe can't come upstairs.
AUSTIN:
I think at some point, like straight up. I think Avar, Ryrira, and M’reb also come down and Avar says, I actually think maybe Ryrira would tell you this Thisbe.
Um, I think, I think, um, it's like,
AUSTIN (Ryrira):
M’reb kept asking where the big deer robot was.
AUSTIN:
Um, and like holds up M’reb. I guess, picks up M’reb. Right. Cause M’reb again, is like three years old at this point. Uh, and, um, M’reb kind of like reaches out to, to like touch your face, um, which I don't know how you deal with that particularly, but that happens.
JANINE:
I think Thisbe probably like ducks her head in a little closer, so they don't have to, to flail around to reach.
AUSTIN:
Um, yeah. Uh, and pets you that doesn't know, or like face -- just like touches your face. Like you're a, you're a cool robot person. M’reb is a baby, is a child, you know? Um.
JANINE:
I got all that shiny stuff in my face. It’s like --
AUSTIN:
Cool.
JANINE:
Shiny.
AUSTIN:
Yeah, absolutely. Totally. It feels cool. Um, anyway, sorry to step on your scene. Broun.
ALI:
Oh, no worries. No, no, no. Um, you know, I think besides that Broun is trying to just calm down and kind of keep their head clear by doing a lot of research. Um, I. Broun it's Broun's spaceships. So they give themselves as an office, which is just like --
AUSTIN:
Uh-huh.
ALI:
The normal engineering room, but with a desk, no -- with two desks in it.
AUSTIN:
Wait, what?
JANINE:
The energy, the energy with which you said “no, with two desks in it.” Was really good.
AUSTIN:
Spoken like the person, like a person who once thought that one desk was enough.
ALI: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Well, I, I keep having this picture of my mind of like Brown's office and there's like the work station.
AUSTIN:
Mmm. Yeah.
ALI:
With like the shit on it and open toolboxes and like different manuals that are just kind of spread around. Um, I think that they keep Asepsis in like a like security fish tank situation.
AUSTIN:
Good, yeah.
ALI:
Where it's like a fish tank within a transparent, like --
AUSTIN:
God.
ALI:
There's hazardous materials in here.
AUSTIN:
Yeah. You want to know what, um, what goes against the Apostolisean transport act is bits and pieces of a, of a stolen Divine. Definitely.
ALI: Well, thanks for the save on that one Thisbe.
Um, uh, and then the, the other table, I think is just one, that's like clean that they have the files that they got from SI on. Um, and that's like Broun’s like -- I think what Broun has been doing, just because they feel so distant from what that actual research is, is just like going over it and like taking different notes that are more organized.
Um, like as if Broun was like, okay, I'm going to sit down and write an outline of all of this random shit that they did.
AUSTIN:
Right.
ALI:
Just to sort of like have a baseline understanding of like what's in the documents before they're like, Oh, I can look, I, I have an understanding of what they're even talking about or whatever else.
AUSTIN:
Yeah. Do you find, is there any, do you make any. Is there any progress in terms of like big picture ideas laying it all out? Like, because I think sometimes writing an outline --
AUSTIN [00:15:00]:
I can help communicate, just be like, all right, here is what is here. You can be like, Oh, wow. Um, there's a lot of talk here about subject A, which means that that must be important, you know?
ALI:
Yeah. Yeah. It's tough. I feel like me, Ali has such a -- Like a distance of what Broun’s like baseline understanding of what those notes would be.
AUSTIN:
Right. Is this something that you go to the Resin Heart folks on board to talk about at all?
ALI:
Probably I -- it's such a weird thing. Cause I, I feel like Broun would share that as being like, Oh, this is probably more important to you than it is me, but still just giving them like a copy of it.
AUSTIN:
Right.
ALI:
You know?
AUSTIN:
You’re still just keeping the main stuff.
ALI:
And then, I --
AUSTIN:
Send them the PDF.
ALI:
Yeah. Um, and then I wonder if there's just like different sort of like, note shorthand that Broun wouldn’t know but that Gur would have used and Avar would probably know or just like, yeah. Yeah.
AUSTIN: That's I think that's probably the bit is like, is like, from working with Valence, you have a certain, there's a lot of stuff that, you know, just from overhearing Valence talk about stuff, but, um, Avar definitely is like.
You know, Gur's bodyguard for years, um, understands shorthand, references, allusions, stuff like that. Um, and I think that they do their best to try to like, Not get you up to speed, but give you the tool set, you know, if that makes sense where it's like, Oh yeah. Um, Gur often said, you know, “As Autonomy says, dah, dah, dah, dah.”
And sometimes that's referencing this and sometimes, you know, like that sort of, that sort of stuff, for sure. Um,
ALI:
Yeah.
AUSTIN:
I think even with this kind of initial. The initial outline that you do, I think does reveal that there's a sort of synthetic process happening, um, in, in these conversations between the two of them in between, like what they're like, they're working on a broader theology, not to have like a state Millennium Break religion necessarily, but to think through the problems of trying to like hold mass and, and bring people together into, into religious, you know, events from all of these different walks.
Um, um, but there is also a degree of like, okay, well, what is, what is, what is true out there? What is up with Autonomy Itself in relation to Perennial in relation to the Divines? Um, and so there's kind of like, you kind of have like a whole heading and it's like, here's how Autonomy Itself works.
So here’s a whole other heading or like, right. Here's all the stuff that we know about Perennial and believe about Perennial. Um, and then like, you know, various subheadings for Divines. Like there are, there are conversations they had about specific Divines where they were like, you know, they went on and on about.
You know, uh, about Courage, for instance, uh, in, in one part, especially after all that Courage shit happened, you know, talking about the, the ways in which, uh, uh, courage represents different things or blah, blah, blah. Like it's, it's, it's a lot. Um, and I don't think that there's like a big takeaway, like you said, um, you know, that you're not going that deep into it, but there is the sort of outline of the project and, and you get a sense of.
It really feels like Valence, you know, like there's a sort of, um, um, a uh, a systematic, um, step-by-step process of this, that you feel Valence shaping. And in fact, I think that goes against some of Gur’s natural instincts. Um, Gur is, uh, uh, tends to jump from topic to topic. Gur tends to, um, you know, very like lines of flight, very like, um, um, uh, stream of consciousness, right?
Guided from one space to another one and, and, you know, notes all over the place. Valance’s presence. If you feel Valence’s presence on this interaction, because what it does is shape all of that chaos into like order. Valence is the one who's constantly. Okay. Let's slow down. Slow down, let's stay on topic here.
Let's talk about this. Or, Hey, remember that connects us back, the topic we were talking about. Um, and well, Valence of the one structuring these things into something that could be considered, you know, almost more like a manuscript than just loose notes, which I think maybe is a discovery in some ways like SI gave this to you, or like, here's a bunch of notes and you realize that there's like numbering on them and like, Oh, wait.
Valence was like, You know, they didn't get to the part where they were, it was a book yet, but they were like, okay, step here is the intro. Here is the here's chapter four.
ALI:
Right. Yeah yeah yeah yeah.
AUSTIN:
This stuff is all in chapter four, you know?
ALI:
Yeah.
AUSTIN:
Um, which is wild. So, so yeah, it's sad.
ALI:
I like that the --
AUSTIN:
I just want to be clear it's it's hard to look at something and see someone in it, you know.
ALI:
Oh, yeah yeah yeah.
AUSTIN:
But you really do.
ALI:
Yeah, I do. I do really like the framing of that because despite how devastating it is, um, I think it makes sense for Broun’s first impulse, when looking at these documents would be like, I should continue the work that Valence was doing.
AUSTIN:
Right.
ALI:
Um, and it feels like the sort of reorganization of these things. Um, they continue to organization of these things are sort of what Valence wanted to do. Um,
AUSTIN:
Yeah. That's interesting. Yeah, I like that. I like it's good. Um, Milli, how about you? What are you getting up to?
SYLVIE:
Yeah, so I kind of think that the way Milli’s passing time is she is trying to get used to like the lack of gravity again.
AUSTIN:
Right.
SYLVIE:
So, like, I think it's a lot of her just like shadow boxing and zero G and shit like that. And like, occasionally like doing something too, like, like punching too hard or something and her whole body spins around. Cause of the momentum or --
AUSTIN:
Yeah.
SYLVIE:
Trying to get, trying to figure out just like the parameters of that and relearn like how to defend herself, if need be.
AUSTIN:
Totally. Totally. Yeah. Um, I think part of the earliest part of this travel is for, for Jesset is working with, uh, Eiden, Eiden Teak is to, um, like make sure that, uh, Jesset's prosthetic does not like break in zero G or like continues to function in a reliable way. Um, um, without gravity, it should be fine, but there's degrees of like, Hey, we're going to make sure that we've some added, um, you know, uh, washers to make sure that the, the, the things aren't like bouncing around and causing damage, et cetera.
Um, Eiden. Uh, who as a reminder is also, um, missing, missing part of a leg. Um, I think has done, has dealt with this before, uh, back back when he was on the front line, um, like was deployed, um, and so, and is also an engineer. And so it has the ability to not just have the ability, but like has the knowledge for kind of space proofing, pros-- prostheses, um, So that's happening in these early days.
Um, other than that, I think Eiden is like deep into like a workout mode. Um, there's a degree of just like, we are going to be up here for a long time. And, um, that means like making sure that you don't lose musculature in zero G um, it means making sure that you, that you, you know, get ahead of any sort of like, uh, atrophy or anything like that.
Um, and generally is just like in that style of. Like military dad mode kind of, I think, like make sure everyone is having the right amount of protein every day. Um, making sure everyone's like, uh, uh, making sure that they all do their daily exercises to keep, to keep, uh, everything right. Um, not like drill Sergeant much more caring than that.
Um, but just checking in, uh, big time. Have you had your vitamins, had you, have you had a glass of water, have you taken your meds energy? Uh, right now. Um, and then, and then, yeah, we've kind of been over most of everybody else here. Si’dra -- what's Si’dra up to? What's the equivalent of just chilling, just vibing. I think that they are, um, I think they're just like working comms with you maybe up in the cockpit.
Um, and are like daily, just like making sure that nothing weird has happened. Um, and I think that that's. Probably real quick. Does anyone have anything else they want to do in this moment before we get to the like stage two, so to speak?
SYLVIE:
I don't have anything.
ALI:
No. Yeah. Um, I think Broun is also sort of doing some of the, like, I don't know that they're getting very far with it, but doing some of the like mechanical adjustments for other things too,
AUSTIN:
Sure.
ALI:
To help with zero G. Um, like besides, uh, the stuff Eiden’s working on. Um, but that's probably, there's something they're working on together.
AUSTIN:
Yeah, definitely. I definitely think there's like a lot of, um, this is a great opportunity for lots of like skill sharing and, you know, light mentorship and stuff like that. Um, so at some point, um, I'd say about four days in say three days in, um, Si’Dra calls and Milli and Broun, like to attention at the coms station, um, or like the comms and scanner station, um, and is like, um, Hey, there's something on the scanners, which, uh, is a little frightening. And points.
Um, and there is an object, uh, seemingly approaching very rapidly from Partizan towards you. And at this point, like you're not near a planet anymore. Partizan, you can't see Partizan anywhere. You can see Girandole. And I guess like on scanners, um, you could see that there is a gravitational object that shows where, you know, Partizan would be.
Um, also like, here's the question. Do you have, is there windows, are these screens, what do you see you? What is able to be brought up on your view screen, or rather, is it a view screen or is it a window?
ALI:
Um, I think the cockpit has very basic windows. Um, I think that they're kind of small and thin, um, because you know, it's just not a priority again for the designer of the space ship. Um, but like, um, almost like, like if a spaceship had like the Mandalorian visor situation.
AUSTIN:
Sure. Yeah yeah yeah yeah. Um as a, as a quick and dirty thing that I, that I like. Talking about the way interfaces look on this machine or on these ships. I think in general, a lot of the interfaces look like the stuff from objects in space, which was this game that came out a few years ago in which you had a spaceship.
And it's just like lots of text on screen, some very basic maps, um, that are like, Hey, here's where you are according to our scanners, but you're not getting like super high quality visual readouts of space around you necessarily. Do you know what I mean? That I think you'd probably have some cameras you can switch to, to see around you.
Um, but the basics of piloting this, it's sort of like piloting a submarine. You don't pilot a submarine by sight. You pilot it by sensor, you know,
ALI:
MmmHmm.
AUSTIN:
Um, and I think so that they point they point to the sensors and there's like some sort of object approaching from the rear, um, uh, very quickly, not like seconds quickly, but very quickly in space terms, because it's hard to move fast and it's not hard to move fast and space, but like closing distances is a intentional thing in a way where you have to burn fuel to close distances quickly, you know?
Um, and so they pointed us and they say like, there's something coming this way. That's not their voice.
AUSTIN (Si’dra):
There's something, um, They're moving in quick and, or it's, it's coming quick. I'm a little worried about it. Uh, they haven't responded to any preliminary comms.
ALI:
Um, is it close enough that we would be able to do like a system scan on our end just to see like what kind of vessel this is?
AUSTIN:
Um, so I think that they probably already gave one their best effort at that. Um, but you can definitely do a gathering information if you want to. That would be a scan.
Any of you are good at scan. None of you are good at scan,
ALI:
Mmmhmm.
AUSTIN: But you could roll a 2d six, take lowest.
ALI:
Mmmhmm. Hmm, sure could. Um, Hmm. Um, yeah, that seems, um, important.
AUSTIN:
Um, Yeah. When you scan you just, you discern the truth around, uh, around you through your vehicle. You might identify the model of an approaching vehicle. You might spot the heat signature of an active generator. You could try to judge a building's a stress point, but study may be better.
ALI:
Pushing myself is two stress?
AUSTIN:
Is two stress. Yeah. You could, um, you could use that spark. You could open the cargo, hold, go into your mech and use your mech scanners. But I don't think they work at that, that it's too far. It's too far space distances are so big.
ALI:
Yeah.
AUSTIN:
The thing that people don't often think about what spaces this is, is that like everything's moving so fast. That distances you have to conceive of them as being they're very far apart, even just inside of the same, like solar system, you know.
ALI:
Yeah. Yeah yeah yeah yeah.
AUSTIN:
You're in the same orbit.
ALI: Um, yeah, the three cheers just wouldn't be capable of that, especially like through space ship walls and all that space. Um, you know, it's just to gather information, no consequences here.
We're just going to get bad information if it's bad.
AUSTIN:
Uh-huh.
ALI:
So I'm going to roll this 2D6 Yup. Maybe it's good.
JANINE:
I mean, I could also, okay.
AUSTIN:
Well what were you -- taking the one, excuse me. Thisbe what were you going to say?
JANINE:
I mean, I also have nothing in scan, but I do have that gather information like bonus.
AUSTIN:
This is true. This is true. Uh, do you want to, do you want to come up to the bridge and work on the comms stuff from there? In the cramped bridge.
JANINE:
I mean, the other things, the other thing that I had in mind to suggest is that like Mow has a bunch of amplifier shit. Um, like we were working as a signal extender basically for, for a bit there.
AUSTIN:
Yep.
JANINE:
Um, I think Thisbe also has a bunch of like, built-in weird radio shit.
AUSTIN:
Yeah. We've talked about that before, for sure. We've seen it. We've seen you use some of it for sure.
JANINE:
Yeah.
AUSTIN:
Um, well, let's, let's resolve this first thing. And then if you want to do a follow-up, I'm fine with doing a follow-up in this case. Um, with the limited information thing, um, what you know is that this thing that looks like it's one it's, if there are, I guess --
AUSTIN: [00:30:00]
Six objects, not one object, it's five things attached to a sixth central thing.
Um, which you know, is probably like. It's probably six, it's probably five, like ah -- smaller ships or something attached to, uh, something that is like getting them out here very quickly. You know, some sort of like, you know, super rocket or something that's like meant to just burn fuel.
JANINE:
The spaceship equivalent of one of those big trucks that carries the cars.
AUSTIN:
Right. Exactly. Yeah. Totally. But yeah, Thisbe. If you want to come upstairs and, or like, if you want to wire Mow down there into the comms, you know, and then bird that quirk to push yourself or something you can,
JANINE:
Yeah, that sounds more, that sounds more Thisbe’s big into interfacing stuff. That makes more sense to me that she would try and like network some stuff together.
AUSTIN:
Yeah.
JANINE:
She’s probably like a little frustrated with. Being down where she can't really see stuff. So it wouldn't make sense that she would try and extend her senses a little bit while down there.
AUSTIN:
Agreed. Um, so, uh, again, you have zero, but you're pushing yourself by burning that cork. Right. Um, and then that gives you one dice in scan. Do you want to do anything else? Do you want to collateral? Do you want a. Whatever. Um, I think there was a bit, does anyone help?
JANINE:
I’m sorry, what do I have?
AUSTIN:
You have one? Right? Cause you've 2D6 take lowest. Cause you don't have anything in scan, but, and you're gonna push yourself with the quirk. I'm guessing the quirk makeshift psyonic amplifier?
JANINE:
Yeah.
AUSTIN:
Yeah, totally. It's like it brings you up to one and if someone else wants to help here, they can. But again, we're at a point where, where we are getting there on, on. Stress for sure.
JANINE:
Okay. Let me just give this a shot.
AUSTIN:
All right, gimme a 1D6.
JANINE:
See how it goes. That's a one.
AUSTIN:
Um, the,
JANINE:
Cool.
AUSTIN:
Yeah, um, with a one I'm giving you information. That information is the sound of Motion. Now you hear it this way and this time the words are intentional and they are.
Uh, and I Millie you, you hear this too. Um,
AUSTIN (Motion):
Did you really think we'd let you get away that easily?
SYLVIE:
Aaaaaaah!
AUSTIN:
So Motion is coming whenever this is, has Motion’s, uh, signature all over it.
Okay. Uh, this is, I should be very clear. Uh, in fact, I'll just announce this as there is a shot rings out, um, or not rings out. I think actually what happens is you hear like the sort of, um, that sort of metal bending sound, um, as, uh, something strikes the ship, I'm revealing two clocks. The first of which is the Blue Channel.
Which is representing the health of the ship. When you have like a temporary ship, a temporary vehicle, it gets its own kind of clock. Um, I'm not replacing the Three Cheers at this point for you. Um, because that would mean we'd have to like re-think about what to switch over to a different playbook and stuff like that.
But for now, it's just, it's this clock, um, uh, for the other, uh, uh, clock. It's the MBK health, it's the millennium breakout kit, um, health, and that's a six step clock. They're both six step clocks. You don't want these to fill, uh, there's these fill bad, bad. It's bad. If these fill, um, the. Thing that I'm doing here as something strikes the ship is I'm going to give you one harm or tick the Blue Channel clock by one as a rival makes the first of three moves that the rival can make.
Um, it is what it is.
SYLVIE:
Ugh!
AUSTIN:
Uh, so it's one, you could resist that if you want to. Um, but boy is resisting a thing, a thing and a thing.
ALI:
Oh my God. Yeah. Oh, cause it's just, you could take your five stress.
AUSTIN:
You could take, you could, you could be out of the scene immediately. If you tried to resist this. I think actually it's weird because you, would you be resisting with your quirks?
Because it's a vehicle. I don't think the book, I don't think the book communicates this super clearly. So again, what, I'm, what I'm counting this as for, just so that we're all on the same page here is what we call a. Um, uh, not a borrowed vehicle, uh, a temporary vehicle, a temporary vehicle is one that does not replace the vehicle on the pilot's character sheet.
This may be because it has been hijacked from an enemy or it's too mundane to bother keeping extensive notes on when a pilot is in a temporary vehicle, they have improved effective vehicle actions. If the vehicle is a higher tier than the squad -- it isn't -- or reduced effect of its lower tier temporary vehicles do not track quirks or damage.
Um, instead, ah, here we go. Instead, they have a progress clock that represents their ability to continue functioning. When the clock fills the vehicle is destroyed in probably spectacular Fac-- uh, fashion pilots can push temporary vehicles by adding two ticks to their destruction and resist consequences by adding three ticks.
ALI:
Oh my god.
AUSTIN:
So that you can't, you can't resist this consequence by doing --
JANINE:
That doesn’t make a lot of sense to me.
AUSTIN:
Um, either way --
ALI:
Yeah.
AUSTIN:
Well, there's other consequences.
JANINE:
In the context -- in the context of resisting the clock that destroys the ship --
AUSTIN:
What you would resist, other things. So for instance, let's say I put that on the MBK. You would resist that by taking it on the Blue Channel, right. Either may overfill, uh, the clock, uh, when a temporary vehicle sustains damage.
The GM adds number of ticks to the destruction clock. According to the consequences list, a mundane vehicles such as a sedan, shuttle, jet ski, et cetera, have for tech destruction clock. Well enemy vehicles such as a tank, a mech, a fighter jet, et cetera, have a six tick destruction clock. Given the push thing, I'm going to increase this to an eight step clock.
Um, since you're going to probably want to spend points to push at a certain point, uh, to give you a little wiggle room, but you're going to probably want to push in order to resist other types of consequences and not obviously not direct hits on this, you know? Um,
ALI:
Yeah, we don't want to take two to not take one,
AUSTIN:
Right. That doesn't make sense. Yes. But you, you might, for instance, want to take damage there to protect the millennium breakout kit or if other types of consequences show up, you know?
ALI:
Yeah.
AUSTIN: Um, Boom, boom. Save changes to size. You're one of eight on this one. There we go. Okay, cool. Thank you. Um, and yes, that's one of three rival actions that Motion can take and you don't even really know what this is yet, but it's coming.
ALI:
And what kind of like happened happened at this point?
AUSTIN:
An object, an object hit the ship, that's all, you know,
ALI:
Oh.
AUSTIN:
Um, uh, you know, your armor plating has sustained some damage. You don't know what type of object.
JANINE:
Is there a fucking gremlin on the wing? My feeling is that like, Oh, maybe that's a, that's a person in a mech who's like hanging on the side of the kinship right now.
ALI: Uh, I'll say,
AUSTIN: uh, your, your scanners are, are good enough to know. Um, I think, you know, Si’dra says,
AUSTIN (Si’dra):
Um, it looks like there's, uh, an object. Okay. And, you know, it's about, I'd say it's about 30, 40 meters long, uh, off of our port.
AUSTIN:
Um, and you know, there's, it doesn't seem to have, um, I guess, I guess if you're able to get a camera, look at it, it's almost like a long metal.
Um, It almost looks like a leaf or something, I guess in shape, but it's like a metal, it's almost just like a piece of metal. And it's sparking as if there's a, I guess, a closer look at it from this camera angle reveals that there was some sort of engine on it. It's almost as if it was like a missile that hit you and didn't explode.
It's sort of what it looks like. Um, that. That might not be what it is. Um, but it is, it is floating in space now, like behind you and you're, you're moving away from it very rapidly, but it did hit you, which is not great. Um, what do y'all do, uh, are there alarms on this ship? Um, I think Jesset yells from down the hall.
AUSTIN (Jesset):
Uh, what did, what was that? What is happening?
ALI (Broun):
Uh, well, we're getting it under control, you know?
AUSTIN:
The baby starts crying, the child starts crying.
ALI:
Sure, sure, sure. Um, Oh, what are my options here?
SYLVIE:
I’m -- so my question is like, so our mechs are at a disadvantage in space, like just as is.
AUSTIN:
Oh, yeah.
SYLVIE:
Um, but is there any way we could like tether one to the ship? I'm trying to think of a way that I can get out there and try and take this thing off the ship. Basically.
AUSTIN:
Sure. Do you want to tether it to the, to the thing? Okay. No, there's nothing on the ship. That was Janine suggesting. Is there a weird gremlin on the ship? I was saying, no, you got hit by a big metal pole, basically that no.
SYLVIE:
No. Okay. I thought it was like stuck on.
AUSTIN:
No, you're just able to look at it as you, as you're flying away from it.
SYLVIE:
Okay. That's okay. That nevermind that I don't -- right now.
AUSTIN:
Yes.
SYLVIE:
I'll think about it. That might be an answer.
JANINE:
It's a real shame I was going to, I was going to suggest that, that Thisbe give Milli a piggyback and clamber around the outside of ship.
AUSTIN:
Oh my god.
JANINE:
That's a real missed opportunity. Don't take that as a suggestion to put a gremlin on the side of the ship.
AUSTIN:
I -- Uh-huh.
ALI:
Um, I feel like there is an opportunity here though, which is like, we put a big belt on one of the mechs
AUSTIN:
Yeah.
ALI:
Attached to a big old bungee cord. Situation.
AUSTIN:
Uh-huh.
ALI:
The mech is floating outside of the ship as we're getting away and can shoot.
AUSTIN:
I mean, you don't even need to, you don't even technically need to leave the ship to do it, right. Presumably, uh, probably safer to though.
SYLVIE:
It’s safer. There's a child onboard.
AUSTIN:
Yeah.
ALI: Um, that might be our defenses. It feels like it's defense time.
AUSTIN:
Yeah.
SYLVIE:
I'm down to try that. That is a sick plan.
AUSTIN:
Yeah.
SYLVIE:
And, um, I just want to make sure I have the description of this thing. We said it looked like on the sensors, like one thing that's propelling, a bunch of other stuff that's attached to it.
AUSTIN:
Correct. So there was a, there was a central like cylinder that is being, that has a ton of, um, uh, um, again, you have to just get, you rolled so bad. I'm not giving you more. There's a cylinder that's getting closer. And that seems to be a vehicle carrying five other things.
SYLVIE:
I'm just looking for my obvious targets, wanted to make sure of that.
AUSTIN:
Yeah, well right now we're in a window where you do have one big obvious target. Um, so there is a window here where, where things could go really well. If you, if you do really well, this is what I would say.
SYLVIE:
I am down to try that and have Milli basically be attached to the ship in her mech.
AUSTIN:
Cool.
SYLVIE:
If we want to, and that way we've got sort of a cannon thing going on as well.
AUSTIN:
Mmmhmm.
ALI:
Yeah. And you have your, you're a good shooty.
SYLVIE:
I'm a pretty good shooty.
AUSTIN:
You're a pretty good shooty. Let it be known.
SYLVIE:
Not bad at all.
AUSTIN:
All right. So I'm going to add that clock that is High Speed Carrier to them, to the thing it's a zero. If you get it to four, then you get to knock this shit out before it gets to you. Okay. Um, Give me a, so what did, what's this stuff like you run back, you run down, there are alarms, um, Thisbe. Are you like, uh, are you also just like attached to something before, before this cargo Bay gets, um --
JANINE:
Pressurized?
AUSTIN:
Pressurized? Yeah.
JANINE:
Yeah. I think Thisbe’s probably got it. Got a tether situation. I kind of imagined Thisbe being tethered in a way that makes sense as part of the flight process. So I imagine.
AUSTIN:
Yeah. Sure.
Okay. And then Milli you get into the slightly damaged, um, uh why have I blanked on the name of your mech?,
SYLVIE:
Stray Dog!
AUSTIN:
Stray Dog, thank you. Um, and hook it up via a bungee cable to, to, uh, the cargo bay. And then y'all depressurize the room and everything, you know, they're the air, all, all escapes. And you could just see space out there.
Um, and you know, with your, with the Stray Dog’s scanners, you're able to like get a, maybe not a lock, but you're able to pull up, right. There's the thermal energy of this high-speed carrier. That's like, you know, zooming towards you picking up speed, getting bigger and bigger as the seconds go by. What do you do?
SYLVIE: I I'm gonna shoot this thing with my big old cannon.
AUSTIN: All right. You do like leave the ship to do it. You like jump out of the back of the ship
SYLVIE:
Yeah, I --
AUSTIN:
Start floating.
SYLVIE: Kind of, I have this idea of it. Like basically. When the Stray, the Stray Dog barely moves off the ship, it basically just like gets off and then the ship is moving away.
So it just, it stays in place basically until there's enough, like less
AUSTIN:
Slack in the rope.
JANINE:
I hate --
AUSTIN:
Scary. Right, right. Yeah. You basically wait until the rope is extended all the way, and then you're kind of like a stable platform in a sense, right? Yeah. Yeah. Great, good, fantastic.
SYLVIE:
Um, and I'm going to spend a quirk to push myself here.
AUSTIN:
Yeah. Okay.
SYLVIE:
Cause I need, I think I do need to push myself to activate. Yeah. I do need to push myself to activate sharpshooter, which is my, like a ranged attack at extreme distance,
AUSTIN:
Which is what this is 100%.
SYLVIE:
Yeah. Um, so I'm going to use the telescopic lens as the quick I’m burning.
AUSTIN:
That makes perfect sense. Um, and uh, the thing is, I know it is the Stray Dog currently has less effect because it's been singed and pierced. Um, I guess this is the time that is a good GM, I should say, Broun. Do you want to have burned two stress, to, to jerry-rig it, to reduce those? That was, uh, the damage effect that --
ALI:
Oh, sure sure.
AUSTIN:
Because you have that says, spent to stress to reduce the effect, but not the level of vehicle damage until the end of the mission. Um, which. Uh, you know, would be, would be this, I think I've had plenty of time to have done this. If this is the thing you would have wanted to do.
ALI:
Yeah, I guess, yeah, we had, we had like half of a downtime, so it's not like a full.
AUSTIN:
Right.
ALI:
Fix. Um, but it was like Brown, definitely doing a once-over. Um, if I'm going to spend your stress, it's going to be, to give --
ALI [00:45:00]:
Sylvie better positioning.
AUSTIN:
We're sure we're going to help with the effect for the rest of the mission basically.
ALI:
Yeah. Yeah yeah yeah.
AUSTIN:
Um, because otherwise this would be limited effect, which yikes.
ALI:
Yeah. Um, yeah, this is the time to use my two stress. Um, so I haven't done it.
AUSTIN:
Okay. Um, So that means Sylvie, Milli has risky standard. Let's say at this point, is it re, I'd say this first shot is controlled, controlled standard.You're pushing yourself.
SYLVIE:
Yeah. Uh, so it will bring me up to 3D6 because I have a two in bombard. Yeah. Yep. I'm assuming this is bombard.
AUSTIN:
Because you're using sharpshooter. I would let you use battle here if you want it to, but you have one in battle right now, anyway. Right. So it's
SYLVIE:
Like if I switch modes,
AUSTIN:
So whatever, it's fine. So yeah. Take, take. Um, so yeah, so then you're at 3D6. Um, do you want a collateral die? It's bad. You shouldn't take this collateral die.
SYLVIE:
I’m not gonna take a collateral die. Not yet. I'm going to, I'm going to defer all this and see what happens.
AUSTIN:
All right. So it's 2D6, no 3D6 Hey! That’s a six!
SYLVIE:
And that's a six,
AUSTIN:
That's a six.
ALI:
Oh yay.
AUSTIN:
Um, so the, the, I will immediately, what I'm going to do is let you know that, uh, what was a total of six objects, uh, or what did I say before? Did I say five objects? A central thing and then four, no, six. Central thing and then, and then, uh, five things on it becomes a central thing with, uh, only three things on it.
As two of the, of the passengers on this high speed carrier get knocked away. Um, I'm gonna increase this clock to, uh, to two out of two out of four. Um, it's getting closer now and now you're not in, um, a controlled position. They know you're here for sure.
SYLVIE:
Yeah. I think another thing for that too, is like the momentum from that shot has to move my mech because I'm in space.
AUSTIN:
Oh. God.
SYLVIE:
Which I think is also less controlled.
AUSTIN: God. Yeah. You're now just like, wait, not flailing, but --
SYLVIE:
Just kind of shot back.
AUSTIN:
Yeah. You're shot back. And, and then, you know, you're trying to like adjust to keep steady. Um, and at this point, I think it's fair that you see, um, you see a light in the distance as something as counter is charging up a counter shot at you.
SYLVIE:
Okay, I --
AUSTIN:
What do you do?
SYLVIE:
Well, I warn everyone on the ship about that.
AUSTIN:
Yeah. Um, Uh, is anyone else doing anything to try to, to try to get away from this thing? I was just --
ALI:
Yeah.
AUSTIN:
Open to the table really quick.
SYLVIE:
I'm kind of a sitting duck right now.
ALI:
Yeah. I think especially with the timing of Milli taking that first shot and then being able to see that like another shot is coming out.
AUSTIN:
Mmmhmm.
ALI:
I think that this is maybe Broun’s opportunity to do some sort of like fancy flying.
AUSTIN:
Yeah. Yeah yeah yeah.
ALI:
To, to be like, yeah, you hit me and then vroom.
AUSTIN:
Yeah, give me a, that sounds like a, that sounds like a maneuver to me.
ALI:
Yeah. Um, that sounds like a maneuver to me as well. Um,
AUSTIN:
so 1D6 risky standard. Do you have anything else to do you getting help? Are you, who are you sure are at the only two stress before it's over? Huh?
ALI:
I sure am at two stress.
AUSTIN:
Do you want to push the Blue Channel by adding three ticks to the clock. Is that what it was three or was it two?
ALI:
That’s so many.
JANINE:
It still doesn't make sense to me, honestly, it seems like a bad deal,
AUSTIN:
It's a, it's a tough, well, you turn over, these are temporary vehicles.
These are not meant to be your permanent vehicle. Right. We're in a unique situation in a sense, because we did not build out a separate sheet for the Blue Channel with its own quirks. This would be the equivalent though, of burning quirks and getting you close to breakdown. So, you know, It's not, it's not too dissimilar in terms of there potentially being long-term damage.
ALI:
Yeah. Um, I was just looking at my items to see if there's maybe --
AUSTIN:
Like some sort of special
ALI:
Possible thing.
AUSTIN:
Yeah.
ALI:
Um, no, I mean, there's like,
AUSTIN:
Oh, we never declared like load. We should do that immediately. Uh,
SYLVIE:
I marked a medium.
AUSTIN:
Sure.
SYLVIE:
I figured that was, that makes sense as for like the infiltration thing to what without saying too much.
AUSTIN:
Yeah. Yeah.
ALI:
Um, I'm going heavy just cause it feels like the thing to do if you're leading this squad. Um, so no shields,
AUSTIN:
Not on --
ALI:
On the Three Cheers.
AUSTIN:
I guess I would, I would let you burn. How do you want to do it? I guess I would say I mean one, the first question is like, does the, does this thing have some sort of, uh, we know that there are not very many shields in the way we think about like star Wars shields in this, in this world. The Panther had something similar to it, but it was extremely rare and not extremely, you know, effect — it was a different type of thing than just a forcefield. Right. Uh, I guess we saw the Catalepsis I want to say, in that one mission had something where like, it could put down big force fields. Um, but, but it didn't have like an all around its body type thing, right?
ALI:
No, no, no, no, no. Yeah. Um,
AUSTIN:
Also pushing is two, I just double checked it pushing is two ticks, not three ticks. And that makes sense with an eight-step clock, because if you push your mech four times, It will, you'll have to break down the mech because you're out of quirks. So that is literally the same in that way. It's just also that you, I mean, also, yeah, you resist, you resist damage with your mech via quirks, so it kind of is kind of an abstraction of the same math,
ALI:
Right? Um, yeah. Um, I mean, I can, I could, I could make the case and I could buy that there would be some sort of like localized shields on this, especially with like something that has such a. A vulnerable cargo Bay that it would be like, Oh, here's this
AUSTIN:
My thought is like, it might just be better if it was just armor than shields only because we just live in that world at this point in partisan where shields are super rare.
ALI:
Not available
AUSTIN:
High, high prototype quality type shit, you know?
ALI:
Yeah. Even in Twilight Mirage, it was like the shields that they had was the two divines,
AUSTIN:
right? Yes, totally. Totally.
JANINE:
Thisbe does have one, but Thisbe is weird.
AUSTIN:
Yeah, Thisbe is weird. Exactly that, yeah, totally.
ALI:
Yeah. I'm just looking at my vehicle gear, being like, Oh, I wish that I could have just, um, declared these four.
AUSTIN:
Thanks. Let's let's say that we should be able to declare it. You should be able to declare something for what this mech or for what this ship has. Right? So maybe on the side, we should just say, okay, there's, let's say four slots or something. Um, or it's probably a medium ship also, right? So five.
ALI:
Yeah. Um, yeah, I -- bwuh -- would I be spending the armor to bring it into play here?
AUSTIN:
The, if you want it to think, I'm looking at the captain sheet right now, right. What we know you have is a hangar Bay, right? Hangar Bay would be two, right. You don't have a ship catapult. I don't think, I think we've seen that. What you do is, uh, you just jump out the back. Right.
ALI:
Mmmhmm. Mmmhmm.
AUSTIN:
That is hangar Bay storage space for smaller vehicles with quick access to the outside. Yep. Um, and then yeah, armor would be another two.
ALI:
And then like cargo space would be the last one?
AUSTIN:
I'm calling it hangar Bay as cargo and cargo space are the same.
ALI:
Okay. That's fair. Okay, cool. Um, yeah, so I would take two armor and then I would probably take like a very basic gun.
AUSTIN:
That makes sense. Yeah. Yeah. Not the fine heavy cannon, but just the machine gun or something, right?
ALI:
Yeah. Yeah.
AUSTIN:
That makes sense. Yeah. Um, maybe, yeah, you don't have to declare that machine gun yet because you haven't used it, but yeah. Sure. Good to know. Um, anyway, you are now going to try to maneuver, right?
ALI:
Yes, yes, yes, yes.
AUSTIN:
Okay. Um, okay. So wait, do you want to spend that armor than to have not taken that first hit? Or do you want to save that for a heavier hit? Maybe you should say that for the heavier hit than one.
ALI:
I think I'm going to save it for now. And then I'm just rolling the one for now.
AUSTIN:
Okay.
ALI:
And then if I get hit, I'll have the armor, right?
AUSTIN:
Yeah. It makes sense. Correct? Yes. Yes, yes. Okay. Okay. So 1D6, Hey, that's a four.
That's not the end of the world. Um, um, but uh, what's going to happen here is, um, you. You do ma you do Dodge, the incoming attack. So you don't take any damage from this. Um, but you don't get to pull away as much as you want it to it's instead of being a standard effect, you're only getting a limited effect.
Um, so that means you only advanced the high-speed carrier by one. Uh, you can choose to resist that, I guess, actually, which would take two, you would, you would resist it by adding three to the Blue Channel. Uh, but that would finish the high-speed carrier thing. There's a note here, which is, we know Motion has two more moves.
I promise you will get something good by doing this, but it is still the case that Motion will not be defeated at this point. You know?
ALI:
Right. I mean, I feel like if we have another opportunity for action here and it's just one more tick.
AUSTIN:
Yeah. That makes sense. Yep. Um, all right. So we are still then in risky standard, the dodges that you did is what, like, you know, that maneuvering is what kind of slowed down your escape, uh, which is why they've been able to get you on you still plus with less things on the high-speed carrier, it's able to make more speed. It has less weight to carry. Um, um, and at this point, I think it's close enough for you to recognize what you're looking at. Especially Milli who's out there with, uh, her long-range weaponry and scanners. This is a kind of big cylindrical object with, with an engine on the back and writing on it, like hooked onto it are three mechs previously it'd been five mechs.
One of them you recognize, uh, immediately Milli. It is the Aponia, which is piloted by Sabeeha
SYLVIE:
Ugh!
AUSTIN:
Who you may remember deceived you back in Auspice a few months ago now. Um, uh, and they immediately like call up over overcomes to you and they say, um,
AUSTIN (Sabeeha):
I told you, I'd see you again, Milli.
SYLVIE:
Am I allowed to block that communication?
AUSTIN:
Yes, totally. Um, other two are, um, mechs you haven't seen before, but, um, you know, because they're adamant arms and an artifice mechs, uh, Broun, these are AdArm Murders named for the collection of crows. Um, they are, um, big, they are meant for, for, uh, space combat, um, primarily. Um, they have very avian features, um, and they're def--they're kind of defining characteristic.
Uh, one is just very high speed maneuverability, uh, in space, very good at quickly, you know, readjusting themselves. They're built for this. Um, but they have this kind of cloak of, um, metal feathers, these like giant metal feathers, which is very clearly the thing that hit you before. Um, and what they do is they can either wear those as like, uh, an armored cloak to prevent damage when they're moving very quickly, which they are right now, um, even on their kind of like as passengers on this carrier, um, or they can deploy them as wings, um, to then shoot, um, and they shoot them off.
And each one has its own little mini engine, sort of like, um, sort of like a funnel in Gundam or something, but they're not, they don't have guns or anything. They're just like missiles that then slam into stuff. Um, and what they tend to do is not, it's not direct fire, you know, that what they do is they get to where.
They can launch a bunch of them and they just kind of like fly around in an orbit and like a swarm of just metal flying around that will tear into anything that tries to pass the space that they've locked down. They're almost like aerial denial. It's sort of like, you know, releasing a swarm of mosquitoes, but each mosquito is just a big metal object.
Um, and if you get hit by it, or if you. If you fly into it, your hull will take serious damage. And that tends to be how they use them. They can also shoot them directly at a target in front of them for, you know, okay. Damage like that little one tick. But it's when they're doing that kind of big swarm attack, that things are really, really rough.
Um, they're not within range to do that yet, thankfully, but that's, that's, what's onboard. So it's two of those murders. Um, Milli already destroyed or knocked off the other two. Um, and then it's the Sabeeha in the Aponia, which for, um, Thisbe who was out on that mission is like a ma is like a mech that can transform into a high-speed plane.
A high-speed jet. Um, and
JANINE:
I thought you were going to say horse.
AUSTIN:
No, sadly not. Aponia, not Eponia.
ALI:
um.
JANINE:
Fine.
AUSTIN:
Slightly different. I know, I know how much you
JANINE:
Fine.
AUSTIN:
Listen, take it up with the ancient Greeks. If the ancient Greeks would call it Eponia and not Aponia I would have, I would have made it a horse probably.
JANINE:
Yeah. Those famous ancient Greek jet planes.
AUSTIN:
Aponia is the absence of pain. All of the, uh, all of the, um, mechs designed by the Zenith project for Apolostolos are named after ancient Greek philosophical terms. Listen. I'm always on my shit and
JANINE:
There was a horse philosopher. They just didn't look hard enough.
AUSTIN:
Uh-huh, yeah. Unfortunately. Um, so yeah, that's, what's there, you still have this one tick left who is doing something?
JANINE:
Um, Hm. Now that they're closer. I think I would like to like take a long, hard look and trying to assess what the weak point. On this, this thing is.
AUSTIN:
Sure.
JANINE:
This conglomeration, like what? From a, from a like mechanical standpoint, even if just like, what you know, is there, is there like a strut?
AUSTIN:
Totally.
JANINE:
Is there something that stands out? Exactly.
AUSTIN:
Um, so is that like, are you doing a scan here to investigate stuff or a survey or something?
JANINE:
I think this is a survey. Because this is just Thisbe just like looking.
AUSTIN:
Yep. Give me a, give me a survey. This again, I think it's just a gather information. So no, no position or effect.
JANINE:
Yeah. It's a one and a two. What is going on?
AUSTIN:
Bad, bad roles today. This is, this is like Scum and Villainy roles happening. Not Partizan. Beam Saber roles. Um, you know, it's moving very, it's hard to get an answer to this. You get some information.
JANINE:
It’s a big tube with stuff on it.
AUSTIN:
if you could, if you could hit the fuel, that would destroy it instantly, you know? Um, um,
JANINE:
Great.
AUSTIN [01:00:00]:
I guess what you see is the, the front of it is very well armored. Um, but, um, there is not a lot of, it really does just go Armor. Fuel tank. There is not like, yeah, anything between those two --
JANINE:
There’s not like anything for me to report to Milli here about like --
AUSTIN:
Sadly.
JANINE:
Shoot the blah.
AUSTIN:
Yeah. I mean, shoot the fuel tank, but it's, it's a tough one was a one or a two, rather.
JANINE:
None of that's going to be news to her.
AUSTIN:
No, she's going to, she's going to know you aim for the fuel tank, unfortunately. Um, yeah. Yeah. But it wasn't a up action anyway. So you didn't take, you're not, there's no negative consequence for this role, because we did just talk about those, it’s a gather information.
So I don't want to, I don't want to penalize you for it. Um,
JANINE:
I appreciate that.
AUSTIN:
Milli, do you wanna take another shot?
SYLVIE:
I feel like I might as well just take another shot at this, right?
AUSTIN:
Yeah, totally. This time don't have your sharpshooter bonus. So I'm going to actually say it's limited, but you only need one tick anyway, so
SYLVIE:
Yeah okay. Uh, I am probably just going to roll this straight up.
AUSTIN:
2D6.
SYLVIE:
Yeah. I want to say that quick just cause my rival has two more moves left.
AUSTIN:
This is true.
SYLVIE:
That's a two and a one. Ick. Wait. Can I use my new move?
AUSTIN:
Oh, you absolutely can use your new move. What's your new move?
SYLVIE:
When you roll a failure on a risky or controlled action, you can choose to make that a partial success by changing the position to desperate.
ALI:
Oh hell yeah.
SYLVIE:
This does not grant XP for taking desperate action.
AUSTIN:
I just want to be 1000% clear. The thing you're doing though, is taking a desperate consequence in order to get this success right.
SYLVIE:
I'm changing. Yeah. I'm putting myself in a desperate position. Right. But,
AUSTIN:
But that means because you're only making a partial success. That still means you get a desperate consequence, you get the success,
SYLVIE:
Oh.
AUSTIN:
But you're not just sliding into a desperate position. Do you see what I'm saying?
SYLVIE:
Okay. Yeah.
AUSTIN:
You're changing the roll to a desperate and because it's a mixed success, but you're getting the success and I won't take that success from you.
JANINE:
It’s one tick, though.
AUSTIN:
It is one tick. But it's a success and I'm not let's lay out. Let me just lay out.
SYLVIE
That’s the thing.
AUSTIN:
Here's the thing that I will, I will outright layout what the situation is if you give me two seconds, right. Um, so right now, uh, this means I have to reveal some clocks, um, that had not shown up previously. Um, there is, there would have, if this thing gets to you, you would have to face the Murders, which are half of these things. And ah -- Motion as another clock. Motion is an eight step clock.
That is not a thing I've decided, Motion is a rival, Motion is acting through Sabeeha and the, the Aponia. Uh, and so, and so that is an eight step clock, no matter what. I would have advanced the murders by half because of having knocked out two of them, but it's still an additional clock.
By getting this tick, what I'm going to do is finish the Murders and advance Motion by two, um, as, as you've done a lot of damage to them by blowing this thing up. Right. Um, uh, so just giving you a little preview here of what this looks like. You take out those remaining two AdArm Murders and Sabeeha and the Aponia get, get hit for two out of eight of that, of, of their clock.
Um, however you would get a desperate concequencs.
SYLVIE:
So I'd basically be taking out two clocks here.
AUSTIN:
You’d be clearly clearing. Yeah. You’re gonna be taking out, you can take out the high-speed carrier and the Murders because the Murders is part of high-speed carrier in a sense, right? Yes. Correct. Correct. Um, uh, so it's, I think it's a big win, um, because the other thing it does is like,
SYLVIE:
Uh, yeah.
AUSTIN:
That's the thing I don't have access to anymore in terms of hurting you. However, I will do a desperate consequence immediately. Um,
SYLVIE:
Fuck it. You know, what? We’re reaching --.
AUSTIN:
Oh, here's the other thing is you could resist that consequence that when that consequence bumps, you can resist it. So that's another thing worth saying, right?
SYLVIE:
Yeah. That’s athing. Right. So I'm going to just take it. I'm going to let this ride, I'm going to use determination to take out the high-speed carrier and to hope that this doesn't hurt too much.
AUSTIN:
Despite everything, it's still you, Milli.
SYLVIE:
Ah.
AUSTIN:
If you feel that determination,
SYLVIE:
Yeah.
AUSTIN:
The shot rings out and it's actually, it's just the thing. It's literally the thing that that Thisbe said. And didn't share with you. I think your shot just hits dead center mass, burns through the armor and, and ignites the fuel still inside of the high-speed carrier. And it explodes, um, what color, what color are space explosions in this show? Very important stylistic choice. Because the anime space explosions, uh, can be any color, really.
ALI:
Yeah. Um,
JANINE:
I'm going to Google coolest fire.
AUSTIN:
Nice, good.
ALI:
Um, I am really partial to the, like the, the, the white circle with like a color on the edge.
AUSTIN:
It's just that with red for like that deep red Partizan stuff?.
ALI:
Oh yeah, yeah. Maybe it's like, um, maybe it's like a red explosion that like on the edges turns purple.
AUSTIN:
Okay. Yes. Ooh. I like that. That sounds good. Okay. Well that happens. Um, and it, and, you know, explodes and then, uh, you know, the, you know, then implodes in a sense, right? Because there's no oxygen here anymore after the.
The stuff explodes. Um, two of the, two of the remaining Murders, uh, explodes. There's none of those left. Um, there they're like feather attack stuff just like flies off in different directions. Um, you're safe. You, you don't get hit by any of that stuff. I'm glad I got to explain how those mechs work without ever showing them on screen, but that's okay.
Um, and then from, you know, from within the, uh, the explosion, the transformed jet form of the Aponia, you know, uh, Shoots forward. Um, and, uh, is, is now very close to you. Um, in fact, I think probably, Hmm. I think that what they do is, uh, as a reminder, the way the Aponia works or the thing that it has on its side, um, is that it has these like.
Energy blades on the, the, um, front of its wings. So I can kind of do like sweeping cuts with, with its blades. Um, and it does that to your, uh, to the, to the, um, The millennium breakout kit. Um, as it, as they fly past it, they cut into one of those containers and immediately, like you just see water leaking out of the, of the ship or of the container and that's important water.
Um, so that's at three, you could resist that if you want to Millie.
SYLVIE:
Yeah, that seems like an important thing to resist. Um,
ALI:
Please!
AUSTIN:
That would be, I would say that that's probably expertise. So that's a two you would need to take off two quirks. Uh,
SYLVIE:
Okay. Um, I'm going to take off my hidden, hidden firing brace because I'm in outer space right now.
AUSTIN:
Uh-huh.
SYLVIE:
Um, and I'm going to get rid of the, I'm going to hit the double jointed limbs as well.
AUSTIN:
So is that like you basically like re um, Like reorienting yourself to then fire on Sabeeha as they get closer to keep them from landing this hit dead on? Okay.
SYLVIE: I think it's a lot of just like rerouting stuff to those, like the stuff I have listed as like overwhelming sensors so I'm able to catch them in time.
AUSTIN: Yeah. I'm going to reduce this. I don't think, you know, it's Partizan and resistance is very rarely complete from especially a desperate attack, but I will reduce it by two, down to only one tick of the MBK health clock. Um, also let me. Note for sure that the high-speed carrier boom gone. There we go. Um, so I, you know, I also think we get a shot from your perspective, uh, into Sabeeha’s cockpit and they are like continuing to trash talk.
You, you just don't hear it, but they are continuing to broadcast at you. Uh, what are y'all doing?
SYLVIE:
Muted Sabeeha on Twitter.
AUSTIN:
[laughs] Um, and this stuff that they're saying for the record is lots of like, it's very much, like "it's not too late to come home, little sister," like very, very cruel. They knew each other in school.
SYLVIE:
They’re all from the same clone program.
JANINE:
That doesn't make it better. That makes it less better.
AUSTIN:
Oh, no, yeah, they're from the same military cloning program.
JANINE:
Yeah.
SYLVIE:
Kind of like family.
AUSTIN:
Uh-huh. There's the family you find and the family that's assigned to you by your military commander, uh, when they pull you out of your cloning tube.
SYLVIE:
God. Um, yeah, I'm trying to think of other stuff I can do right now, especially after like, My mech, it has got like, my options got limited a little bit there.
So give me a minute.
AUSTIN:
Oh yeah.
SYLVIE:
Something from Milli.
AUSTIN:
All right. Back then to Thisbe or, or Broun. Um, yeah.
JANINE:
Um, so how close, how, how what's the distance looking like right now?
AUSTIN: It's almost as if you're a ship, you're a ship in the sea and they are a jet kind of doing. Strafing runs, you know, um, and that distance is the distance is not in, in earth terms. It would be very far, but the speeds that they're moving at are so fast that it's not, um, they're making close passes regularly is what I would guess, I would say, um, close is, still far, but it's not that far, you know, within a mile.
Do you know what I mean? And that's very close for space terms. What did you have in mind? And because then we could also talk about how to set up a situation in which what you have in mind is, is more likely or whatever.
JANINE:
I don't know. I don’t really --
AUSTIN:
You just wanted to know. That’s fine.
JANINE:
I, yeah, I was hoping that would, that would jog me a little bit.
AUSTIN:
Yeah. As of right now, they are not like landing on the ship, you know? Um, could they be goaded into that? Maybe.
ALI:
Um, yeah, I'm wondering like what my options are from the captain's seat. Right. Um,
AUSTIN:
Yeah. You do have, again, you do have that thing. That's undeclared inside of the vessel, right? You could, you could declare a weapon here.
ALI:
Right. Um, and at this point the transport has been destroyed and we just have the one mech approaching us?
AUSTIN:
Just the one mech. It's just, it's just the, uh, Aponia, which, you know, has Motion aboard, or is being, you know, powered by Motion here.
ALI:
Yeah. Maybe this is the, uh, the machine gun time. Um,
AUSTIN:
Yeah, you think machine gun, not missiles or rockets or -- That's probably right.
ALI:
I feel like if I wanted a missile or rocket, I would be doing what Millie is doing with the Three Cheers
AUSTIN:
Fair, fair.
ALI:
Which is a missile machine.
AUSTIN:
Yeah, yeah.
ALI:
Um, yeah, I think that's it.
AUSTIN:
Okay, so declare that machine gun. Um, um, and then what are you -- let's see, um, that's probably battle then, right?
ALI:
Um, when I bombard, I use vehicle weapons as I did attack targets beyond human sight.
AUSTIN:
Yeah. But bombard would be, that's why I was asking, do you want to do -- one? I did just say it within visual sight.
ALI:
Okay, yeah yeah.
AUSTIN:
I did just say very distinctly within visual sight now.
ALI:
Okay, yeah.
AUSTIN:
But that's why I was kind of like, you want to do missiles here cause the missiles feel more like bombard. Um, whereas battle very much feels like this is at this point, firing up a machine gun at this thing is definitely you fire a Gatling gun in a dog fight. Right? I'll give you the classic leap thing there, which is I'll let you do bombard. It'll be lower effect because a machine gun is built to be shot at a thing you're aimed at.
Not at a thing that is, Oh, though what I will say is we haven't talked about the fact that you're not lining up shots in that same way. It's all based on scanner stuff here, right? None of this is. Um, none of this is visual contact aiming, right? Unless you have Millennium Falcon style turrets, and like, you know, Avar and Eiden are down in though. You know what I mean? That then would be done.
ALI:
Yeah. I don't think it's like, Luke's getting in a spinning of a chair like this.
AUSTIN:
Right then. Yeah. Then, then actually, maybe, actually all of it is a bombard because it's all just based on scanner stuff. None of it's within visual it's none of it's aiming up a shot. All of it is giving Si’dra, you know, coordinates to aim at and fire.
ALI:
Yeah. Um,
AUSTIN:
All right. Yeah, let's go with that then now, like we've talked through it. Risky standard for sure. And this is just a 2D6.
AUSTIN: Oh, my God, these rolls. What are you doing with these rolls? What is happening with these roles? There's a three, that's a three. I've never seen this whole season. The rolls have never been this bad. I swear to God.
SYLVIE:
We should've stayed on the planet!
[LAUGHTER]
AUSTIN:
Um, so yeah, that's a there and there's no, there's not. Okay. I'm just checking to see there's no other. Alright. Um, The, the shots go wide. Uh, Sabeeha is just a better pilot than this, right. Um, and I think the, the, uh, the Blue Channel, um, at this point again, uh, Sabeeha does a pass. Um, and like, um, “No, no, no, no, no, no, no. I'll show you how to shoot a target,” and pulls the trigger and, uh, you know, a volley of Vulcan cannon fire sweeps across the blue channel for two damage. So I'm increasing that to three, um, who who's next?
JANINE:
Um, hi. I am trying to figure out which weapon I want to declare on Mow.
AUSTIN:
Ooh, good question.
JANINE:
Um, I had like a fun idea, but it just, it seemed pointless.
AUSTIN:
So what's the fun idea?
JANINE:
The fun idea was to tie a bunch of bombs to a grapnel anchor tool, and then let go of the grapnel anchor tool if it was shot at, at the other thing.
And then it would like retract and pull all the bombs onto of them. But the thing is, that's kind of just a rack of missile or rockets. Like it's a fun idea, but there's no reason to do that instead of just declaring a gun.
AUSTIN:
I guess it's fun as shit though.
JANINE:
It's fun, but it doesn't make sense.
AUSTIN:
Ali, go ahead.
ALI [01:15:00]:
I feel like that makes sense because declaring it, you have to stay with all of the time. Whereas the, the other plan is very situational.
AUSTIN:
Yeah. The thing that I would say is if you did, like, I think that there's different effect level there, right? Um, because if you're like deploying a big minefield behind you, that's, that's denying a whole bunch of space for Sabeeha, To to have to --
JANINE:
That feels like a thing we can't do because of Milli, because Milli’s going to get dragged through those fucking mines.
AUSTIN:
Does this put a Milli in a more desperate position, but also increases the effect on a success here? Or introduces -- you're right. Introduced, introduces the potential that Milli takes damage for sure. Uh,
SYLVIE:
no, no, no. I'm going to say if this is like an in character, like discussion that ends up happening, Milli would be fine with that. She'd get it.
AUSTIN:
What would Millie say in response to laying out this plan?
SYLVIE (Milli):
I mean, we don't have any better options right now and I, you know, there's something. A little nicer about being blown up by your friends than being blown up by your enemies. So if I’m going to go out --
JANINE:
So I think I would say the other thing I would say is that actually to me, that sounds like bombard and I have no points in bombard, so I don't want that.
AUSTIN:
Um, I think it could be, I was actually going to say that that could be destroy.
JANINE:
I'll take, okay. I'll take destroy.
AUSTIN:
You carpet bomb a military base. That to me is what you're doing,
JANINE:
But, but yeah. That’s different than mines.
AUSTIN:
Yeah, but that's, you know what I'm saying? Right. Because you're not bombard is also close, but I think that the idea of just like, we're opening this up and dropping a bunch of tethered mines out the back to just destroy everything behind us, especially if you time it so that it's like, you know, you do the, you F maybe Avar, even as someone who communicates this.
Um, they're like, um, “Set, set a seven second timer. Uh, there'll be beyond Millie before the, before they're active,” you know, that way you can pull away before they, whatever. Um,
JANINE:
That’s a good idea.
AUSTIN:
Boom. Um, so yeah, give me, uh, give me a destroy.
JANINE:
What does that count? Was that, would that be, um,
AUSTIN:
Is that a rack of missiles or rockets maybe?
JANINE:
Destruction tools or?
AUSTIN:
They could be destruction. Oh, wait. Don't do you have like, find that you have fine destruction tools? Um, there too, they're too, it'd be two, um, slots on your load, but you do have find destruction tools and find would make them that would, that would increase your effect. I've already said that this has already a better effect, right? So maybe it's not worth that.
The thing about the thing about making it a rack of missiles or rockets is that you could come back to it. Then the way we talk about it is literally just Mow is able to fire, like fucking tethered mines at things. And that's fun.
JANINE:
That is fun. That is fun.
AUSTIN:
A case full of guided or unguided self-propelled explosives.
JANINE:
Unguided. They are unguided.
AUSTIN:
I guess, propelled in this case is just the force of Mow launching.
JANINE:
Well, I mean, the propel thing is like, you could tell them to stop propelling, right.
AUSTIN:
True. Yeah yeah yeah yeah.
JANINE:
Just get them propelled to the distance.
AUSTIN:
Yeah yeah yeah yeah.
JANINE:
And then you have them.
AUSTIN: Totally. Or just, they have that money for them or they have that much distance. Yeah, totally.
JANINE:
I kind of love the idea that they're just like remote controls, fucking little, little rockets that just scoot out there and then hang out with,
AUSTIN:
Yeah. All right. Let's do it destroy 2D6. Do you push, do you want to push Mow at all? Burn a quirk?
JANINE:
Uh,
AUSTIN:
Also, yeah. Is this originally, I'm looking at scary weapon here, which you don't need to do, but is this originally some sort of big, like, yeah, we use this for, um, tearing apart space, uh, debris or whatever, you know,
JANINE:
I mean, that makes sense.
AUSTIN:
Sure. Delayed destruction charges or whatever.
JANINE:
I'll burn a quirk on that. Why not?
AUSTIN:
Boom. It's a 3D6, uh, risky, great.
JANINE:
This one’s a four, there.
AUSTIN:
Four -- there are there that listen honestly, better than, better than what it's been before. Right. Um, the, uh, the, Hm. How do I want to give this to you? Okay. So, um, Sabeeha, you know, is continuing to do these strafing runs and then, and then they have to like pull back behind you at a certain point.
Um, you've like released a bunch of these at this point, and then just like. Things go quiet for a second. And then there's a string of explosions. Uh, as, as the Aponia is rocked by a bunch of these mines that you've placed behind them. Um, uh, this is very good because it means that they can't approach you from your, your, um, weakest position anymore.
Um, uh, however, the consequence here is that things get. Desperate going forward. Um, actually, you know what I think I can do, I can do this was a risky consequence, right? Uh, so. And your two controlled consequences. All right. So, um, you're moving to a worse position, uh, and you are, um, adjusting, uh, clock by one as damaged from this explosion, uh, and angered by it.
Sabeeha pulls up closer, like, you know, After burners their way to you and lands on the top, top of the ship.
[Music begins: TANAGER. PERFECT. TOUCHPAPER.]
Um, uh, and begins to just like start to cut down with these kinds of daggers that they have, which, uh, you know, has transformed into a humanoid mode at this point and begins to just kind of like strike down at the armor plating on top of the Blue Channel, you are now in a desperate position, uh, but the emotion clock has been ticked, uh, Up to five with your great success.