No worries :)

“Indeed.” Kaya answered Rei's two questions. She briefly considered talking more about the medical aspect of things but since some of it was private, and the rest would have to wait for the last member of her crew, she simply stopped there for the time being. Plus, she still had no idea how she was expected to "make sure Rei kept her blood sugar in check".

When Péri asked if anyone had seen the captain, she was briefly, but intensely, tempted to say no and prompt her copilot to share what she expected. However while the answer would likely have been entertaining, despite her young age and inexperience Kaya wasn't about to make Peri the victim of a bad joke, especially considering that none of the other had gone through it.

Plus, considering the look her copilot and her engineer had exchanged... Well... So instead, she simply answered with a “That would be me.” Kaya walked to the front, giving some time for Peri to get over her surprise.

“Major O'Bannon scheduled a slot for us at the yard's obstacle course at 1000 so we'll keep it short for the time being. We'll have plenty of time later on to go over everything that needs to be addressed.” She paused to quickly look at everyone. “I am Lieutenant Wilden and I'll be your captain. Pilot second-class Von Helmon will be the copilot, Engineer second-class Shashidar is our engineer, Sergent Polovich will be in charge of ground operations and finally Ms Yamahato is the ship's doctor. We have been assigned to the Archer-class Gryffin.”

She paused for a second, then resumed, “Our first mission is to find Georgia Millstock who was allegedly kidnapped a year ago.” She displayed an image of the woman, “I say allegedly because she has resurfaced in the system of Little Giant, apparently free.” Georgia's picture was replaced by the footage from the Terminal 2 gate in the Vanilla space port. “The man's name is Wexler Wineburger. He is a small time smuggler, apparently with a specialization in eggs. Quail eggs at the moment to be precise. Don't ask, I don't know.” She shrugged, “Anyway, we are to first assess Ms. Millstock's situation both to confirm her identity and determine if she is still held hostage or if something else is going on.”

“If we do determine that she is still hostage, we are to rescue her,” Her gaze turned to Rokzi, “and do so without giving any indication that Fleet is involved. At least until she is returned to her family anyway. If however she appears to follow Mr. Wineburger on her own free will we are to report and follow until further orders.” And who knew where that could take them all.

“Questions?”

In reply to Kaya Wilden (msg # 29):

Peri is indeed shocked.  But she glances at the insignia and seems to pick up that no one else is all that shocked.  She wipes her incredulous look off her face.  But you notice her glancing at your neck.  The spot an AI port should be.

But she says nothing.

When you explain the mission, everyone looks at you.  No one says anything for a moment.

Than Aarav says, "Eggs..."

Rokzi, whose balanced his chin on one fist, elbow on the table, elaborates.  "Quail eggs."

"What's a quail?"

Peri glances towards Aarav but looks away.  She simply says, "Small bird from Old Earth.  They populate them in reserves so rich people who don't like to sweat can hunt something."

She shrugs.  She glances at Rei, frowns, but doesn't say anything.  Peri looks back at you.  "Are we Special Ops now?  This sounds like a Spec Ops mission."

"Does it matter?"  Rokzi stands up. "Orders are orders.  Anything else for now?  Or can I give that new turret a spineroo?"

No one says anything Unless you have something to add.  Moving on...

---

The test course runs the length of a mined out section of this system's asteroid belt.  The control station for the course has sent you a flight path and a couple of questions.


Good Afternoon Captain Wilden.

You are confirmed for 10 00 run.

You have the course reserved until 1 00.  Film and analysis will be provided.

How many runs through the course do you want?

How many of those runs do you want with drones?

Do you want any drones to return fire?


A run will take you about 15 minutes.

You can do just a vanilla run around the course.

You can have drones released into the course kind of like a shooting range.

The drones can 'return fire'.  The fire is non lethal light beams.  More or less like laser tag for space ships.  Except your fire is real.

Let me know how many runs you want to do and how many of each type-vanilla, plain drone, and friendly fire drones.

QUestions?  Thanks

Kaya had stayed behind after the briefing: she wanted to allow anyone to talk to her privately before boarding, to leave the crew alone for the time being to share their impressions of their new CO - even though she'd have loved hearing about it - and maybe more importantly... because she was damn hungry and wanted to take advantage of the snacks she had ordered.

---

“Thank you Control.” The young lieutenant transmitted. “We'll go with four for now: no drones on the first two, dummy drones on the third, not sure yet on the fourth. If needed and time permitting we'll repeat the third, and go full drones on the fifth.” Which would mostly depend on how much adjustments they'd need to make after the first three runs, but time might be an issue: after all, four runs left them with an average of 40 minutes between each of them, while five would lower that to 25. It could be enough, but only if there wasn't any tweaks they'd have to make that would required any time. “I'll let you know as soon as we finish the third.”

To her crew, she explained, “Alright, first two runs we'll just recon the course. I'll pilot solo on the first and you'll do the second one Peri, solo too.” After all, she needed both Peri to show that she could pilot by herself if need be, and to get a feel of the ship so that she'd be better able to help Kaya. And for Kaya, it was a way to show that she was perfectly comfortable with leaving the ship in her copilot's hands. That wasn't 100% true of course - no pilot was comfortable in a ship she wasn't piloting herself - but, well...
Peri would no doubt try to impress Kaya or even show that she was better, but that was fine. Plus, while Peri would have the advantage of going second, Kaya had taken some time on the simulator so all in all it should be relatively fair. “Just testing things out so that we can both get a feel of the ship.”

“On the third, we'll pilot as we should,” which meant her as a pilot, Peri as co-pilot tagging boggies, handling navigation, coms and so on, “While Rokzi will try to destroy the drones running around.” Which should allow him both to calibrate the turret to his preferences and get used to the way she handled the ship, while Peri and herself would work out the way they wanted things to run. Or to be precise, she showed Peri how she flew and what she expected of her since she knew pretty well what to expect from AI pilots. “If there's more to calibrate, we'll repeat that run, but on the last we'll go the whole way.”

She paused, for a second, “Now, obviously we're a new crew, on a ship none of us really know, so I'm not expecting any kind of record. I'd be disappointed if we didn't get on the score board though.” Though to be fair, as long as they avoided figuring in the "Epic Fails" column, it'd be good enough, considering...but that wasn't how you motivated your crew.

“Aarav, I expect you to monitor the ship on every run and make the tweaks needed,” it'd be mostly software of course, but that was still a big part of the ship, so... “but talk to me before you change an important setting. And keep any tweaks you'd make on the second run on a separate profile.” After all, it might be important at some point to load settings that would match Peri's style, but for the most part they'd go with the settings that matched her best...which could either be pretty much the same...or very different. She wasn't too sure yet. Of course hardware tweaks would have to stay so Peri would have to work with those, but software ones could be loaded pretty fast and Kaya didn't mind making her copilot's life a bit easier.

“Understood?” She asked everyone, “Questions?”
This message was last edited by the player at 21:18, Sun 09 May 2021.

In reply to Kaya Wilden (msg # 31):

The only one who comes back after the briefing is Rei.

She nods to you when she slips inside the door and helps herself to a sweet-soy danish.

"I know we don't have long."  Glancing at the clock, she nibbles on her danish and continues.  "But I wanted to make sure we were on the same page.  My real job here is to monitor your vitals. I'm supposed to send a report to O'Bannon and Ogadi monthly detailing the state of your health and provide brain scans.  So at least once a month, I'll need a couple of hours of your time to run tests.  Besides that, I'll do medic duty.

"Any other orders you have for me?"

---

"We're good to boil."

On your comm screen, you can see Aarav at the Engine Ops (EO) board.  "Good to boil" is the usual slang for an engine warmed up and ready to go.

Rokzi is on another split screen.  He's seated up in the turret, studying the various display screens.  He mutters the traditional, "Gunnery Ho," signifying his readiness although he won't actually do anything yet.

"Nav comm up.  Word in from Course Control.  Proceed when you're ready."

Peri hasn't said much.  Only the usual chatter about systems.  She's been keeping up on her tasks.  If this is how she performs nomrally, you won't have complaints.  How she flies is another question.  But as nav and communications, she's on top of things.

The "vanilla" course isn't quite vanilla.  It is also random.  Course Control activates various beacons scattered throughout the asteroid field.  You have to pilot the ship past the beacons in a certain order.  Some of the course will be pedestrian. Some will require tight cornering.  Since it's vanilla, the speed you take it is up to you.

Okay.  Something we're going to make up on the fly here.  Here's my proposal:

In-system speed (ISS) is how fast you travel within a system.  Far Light (FL) speed is for traveling between systems.  Standard Sol Time (SST) is how the Empire measures time.  It's based on the old Earth calendar.

FL speed just has one setting:  very frickin' fast.  You can get between systems usually in a SST week.  Using it in system is overkill.  No one has been able, AI or Ace, to time it so you can pop across a system using FL speed.  By the time you engage it, FL pretty much has you well outside the system.  It's just that fast.

ISS has five 'speeds' or modes, one to five.

One is more or less neutral.  It's what you use for docking or tooling around a space station.

Two is used for breaking orbits and entering orbits.

Three to five is where your job grade comes in.

Three is the work horse speed.  It's going the speed limit and probably where most of your day to day piloting will occur.  Ship control is easier.  But dodging torpedoes becomes a lot more interesting.

Four is for dog fights.  It's faster, harder to manage.  But it's where you can out maneuver torpedos or enemy fighters.  Both of whom will usually be going at fours themselves.

Five is designed for crossing the system quickly.  Where you can cross Earth's system at a speed three in a SST week, you can cross Earth's system in a little over two days at a five.  You can use it in dog fighting.  But obviously, you really need to be on top of it to do so.

Let me know what you think about that, and we'll move on to how to handle piloting.

Thanks

ISS, SST and FL work fine with me, no problem :)
I snipped the part about Kaya's piloting from the previous post to put it at the end of this one.

Kaya nodded at Rei's explanation, grimacing at times particularly when the brain scans where mentioned: she obviously didn't like being reminded that at some point her brain would start leaking from her ears... “I can manage to have a couple of hours a month to devote to you. I suppose you'd want one soon to establish a sort of baseline?” The young lieutenant paused while she considered the issue, then shrugged, “I guess we'll have the time when we're en route to Little Giant let me know when you have everything worked out and we'll deal with that.”

“Other than that, well, besides the fact that I'll expect you to take care of every medical needs on the ship - not that I don't think you wouldn't, but some things are better said than assumed - there's just one thing: I'm apparently supposed to 'make sure you monitor you blood sugar because a civilian dying on a fleet ship would look bad'. Now, not only I find the idea that you wouldn't do it silly, but on top of that you're the expert, not me and I don't think you need me to hover over you when you do it.”

She paused, frowning, then added, “That being said, maybe it'd be a good thing if someone on the ship could do it for you in case of an emergency, and know what to do in case of an anomaly. And unless you're comfortable asking someone else, I suppose that would have to be me. Other than that...” She shrugged, “Can you send me a small message once a day to tell me you've taken care of your 'monitoring duties'? I'm perfectly fine if it's a preprogrammed message...” She briefly glanced around though.

---

Kaya was at least reassured that Peri knew what she was doing as far as being a co-pilot was concerned. It remained to be seen how she'd handle the ship solo, but hopefully that would never really matter in anything but routine operations.

The fact that the course had random elements was not an unpleasant surprise: it made sense, and knowing what the course was beforehand would have made things dull. On the other hand, it sort of made grading more difficult, but she supposed Control had a system in place for those things.

Considering the ship, she was looking forward for the tight corners segments of the course, and the fact that it was also the part where good and bad pilots would be separated didn't diminish the feeling at all. As for the more 'pedestrian' segments... Well... On those she'd have to push the ship and see how it handled. Though she doubted she'd have the opportunity to go as far as ISS5. But hopefully, it would handle fine at ISS4, because that would be the most important one...

And despite what she had said, Kaya had every intention on her first run to impress her crew: she was going to push the ship and test things out to see how it reacted since it was an important thing to do, but more than anything, she needed them to know that she wasn't a hack, she needed to build their confidence in her. She wasn't going to take serious risks, but where she could shave half a second, she would.

She didn't want them to see her as one of the fleet's best pilots as she held no illusions that she was...but she wanted them to realize that she had the potential to be there one day. If she survived that long anyway...

In reply to Kaya Wilden (msg # 33):

Rei seems to be surpressing a frown when you mention her blood sugar.  But she shrugs.

"Yeah.  That sounds fair.

"We'll set up a time right after we get underway for Little Giant then.  I'll get my baselines and show you how to handle an insulin injection.  Also where it is.  Probably wouldn't be a bad idea to make sure you know how to run the Auto Doc just in case I'm down for the count."

---

Good.  Then here is how we will proceed.

Usually, I will assume you pull off whatever maneuver.  You're you after all.  However, because it would get dull if you did everything flawlessly, at times (especially during dog fights) I'll call for tests.

Here's how I'm proposing we handle the tests.  I will set a target number for the maneuver.  You will not know what it is.  The number will range from 2 to 11.  I'll give you a description of the situation and you'll have to guess the number based on that.  Usually the higher the Target value, the tougher the maneuver.  Usually.

You will roll a d6.  You'll then decide on a speed you're going to pull the maneuver at (1 to 5).  That obviously gives you the range of 2 to 11.

After you come up with that number, you being you can adjust that final number up or down by 2.  That's the Ace advantage.

You are trying to hit the target number exactly.  You do that, you pull it off flawlessly.

If you go over or under, you'll still pull it off.  But the wider the variance, the less perfect that maneuver is.  The only way you'll fail is if you really bomb it or if there's some factor you've overlooked.

You being you, you will have the option of asking clarifying questions before you roll the die.  But you only get one posts worth of questions and once you post a die roll, no questions are allowed.

I'd like to test run this system as we go through the test course runs.  Just to see if it works for both of us.  Like I said, it's mostly just to help inject a little bit of chaos into the actiony sequences.

Let me know if there are questions.

So let's start...

You pull Gryffin up in line with the starting beacon.  You're about a click away from the field.  It's enough distance to let you get a good head of speed.  Of course, running fast into an asteroid field isn't what a lot of people call wise.  But what do they know?

Peri toggles her main screen.  "I've got confirm from course control.  Lock on the first beacon in 5...4...3...2....1...Go!"

"We're boiling," Aarav says as the engines hit 60% and start to climb.

The first beacon is a click inside the field.  It's an easy peasy shot.  You have to weave around two large rocks and avoid a handful of small ones.  But nothing problematic.  As you round the last large rock, the beacon comes up on the display.

"Lock on second beacon...It's behind us."

Control is being sneaky.  The second beacon is almost back where you entered the field.  You'll either have to try to pull of a hard turn here or do a 360 around the large rock the first beacon is orbiting.

To give you a top down visual (and sorry, I suck at maps)

                     R                  RRR
                                      RRRRRR
                                      RRRRRRR
                                       RRRR      b1
                                                      G

                          R              R          R      RRRR
                                                          RRRRRR
                                                           RRRR

                                     R          R   R         R   R

                                           RRRRRRRRRRRR      R
                                          RRRRRRRRRRRRRR
                                          RRRRRRRRRRRRRR
                                            RRRRRRRRRR
                                             RRRRRRRRRR

                               R              R           R   R   R

      R         R        R         R            R       R

                  R           R           R                 R

                          R  b2                R                    R

The R's are asteroids.  The grouped ones are the bigger rocks.

G is Gryffin

b1 and b2 are the beacons.  You are coming at b1 right now in a north west direction.

If you go around the big rock b1 is orbiting, it's safer, but you'll give up some time on your course run.

A hard turn would require a test.

Let me know if there are questions.  Thanks

Sure, I can work with that, we can tweak it as necessary if needed anyway.
When you say "adjust up or down by 2", is it {-2, +2}, or {-2, -1, 0, +1, +2}?

As soon as Peri gave the "go", Kaya got "in the zone" and pushed the engine. Not quite to redlight them - that wasn't the goal yet - but simply because she wasn't the type to take the slow road when she could go fast.

Reaching the first beacon wasn't much of a problem and mostly allowed her to confirm the sensations she had had from the simulator but the location of the second beacon represented a challenge. Thing was, she loved challenges. Maybe she loved nothing more than challenges.

Quickly, she started to go through her options, and she saw two...or three. The first, safest one, would be to just adjust course to go around one of the large rocks. It would be easy, but also quite boring. The second option would be to go for a sharp turn around the beacon itself. It'd be much tighter, harder to pull off, but also much faster.

She saw a third option though: cut the propulsion entirely, pivot the ship on attitude thrusters to do a precise 180°, then punch it. In principle, it was a simple plan, but the execution of it was something else entirely as she'd need to time things out very precisely to cancel the ship's inertia just right to get them in the correct direction.

The two possible issues were that she'd effectively have to stop before going forward again which might be a loss of time. On the other hand, if the engines responded just right, it wouldn't take much more time than a sharp turn and more importantly, it would make the rest of the navigation easier which hopefully would allow her to more than make up for lost time. The biggest problem was to know if the engines and thrusters could handle something like that...which she quickly checked to make sure.

Is the 180° thing even possible? If it's not, Kaya will just go for the hard turn.
At any rate I guess that's where I ask the questions? And that asking "on a scale of 2 to 11, how difficult is it?" is a no-no :D
Not sure what to ask though. Except maybe what would be the most difficult part of the hard turn? Something like getting the ship in the right direction to go for the second beacon or are there small rocks that could be in the way?

In reply to Kaya Wilden (msg # 35):

I may have accidentally edited your last post.  Think I corrected it, but let me know if anything changed.  Sorry about that.

You can select any number in the -2 to 2 range {-2, -1, 0, 1, 2}

You can swing around that rock in a gentle 180.  That would be a standard move and not require any kind of test.

A "hard turn" is the 180 degree option.  Flipping the Gryffin around right where you are now.  I would think it is possible.  Well.  In a sci fi universe it would be possible.

You'd be "braking hard" by firing reverse engines, "spinning the ship" by firing a side facing engine at the same time, and then when you're in position, throwing the engines into forward.  Basically, the Hollywood stunt driver's version of making a U turn.  Except in space at near light speed.

So the hard part of a Hard Turn is flipping the ship around.  You have to keep the ship from veering too far as it flips or you might slam into an asteroid nearby.  Or the beacon.

Once you've flipped the ship, you're just driving again.

I would say this is a dog fighting style maneuver.  So Kaya has probably done something similar in flight school.  She knows how to do and has probably done it a few times in a simulator.

Clear as mud?

I think everything's there. And if something's missing I don't know what it was so it's probably alright.

As for the rest, it's clear! So I'm going to assume it'd be a manoeuvrer in the 8-9 range, more likely 8 than 9: complex with possibilities to mess up, but rather straightforward, known & practised, and without any real complications to expect.
So let's roll the die: 2
So assuming it's an 8, I'd go with speed 4, adding the Ace's +2 for a total of 8. If it's a 9, I'd just go with speed 5 but I'm not sure I can do that though: I know the real target number only when all's said and done I assume. Or I know the number before I adjust by +2/-2?

In reply to Kaya Wilden (msg # 37):

What fun would it be knowing the number before you input your adjustment?

I would not recommend going with speed 5.  Too fast to control for such a tight maneuver.  Remember, unless you realllllllllly bomb one of these tests, you're going to pull off the maneuvr.  Just not perfectly.

Since we're using this one as a test, I will tell you:  the target number I set on this was a 7.  My reasoning was this:

               Kaya has trained on this maneuver.

               Kaya has not pulled off a hard turn maneuver in this ship before.

               You are in an asteroid field, but it is a monitored obstacle course.

               The beacon and one rock are close enough to cause you some issues, but
               neither is large enough to damage the ship terribly much.  

Those are the factors I considered for the difficulty.  I considered making it a 6 honestly.  But decided to bump it up one due to the beacon complicating things.


Since you bring up Speed 5, if you did use it, I would have to adjust the test number on the fly.  Probably upwards to a 11 or 12.  Speed 5 is that fast.  Unless you are trying to flee or are really desperate, I would recommend avoiding speed 5.

Let's just go say you went with the 8.

The Gryffin lurches a bit too hard on the port side as you flip it around.  The side thruster that broke your spin has a bit more kick to it than you thought.  You can see Peri looks up when you brake, frowning.  Looks like the same thought is going through her mind.

Or she thinks you did that badly.

You send the ship forward, weaving around the intervening rocks and see beacon 2 ahead.

Peri studies her screens.  "Got a lock on beacon 3.  Damn.  It's all the way at the other end of the field."

Next situation then.

You are near the outer edge of the field.  Beacon 3 is on the far side of the field.

There are two options, at least that I can see.  You may come up with another one on your own.

First, the safe bet.  You can climb above or below the asteroid field and fly over/under it, then dive down into the field and hit beacon 3.  No test required.  It will eat up time.

Second, the fun option. Turn and Burn.  You head back through the field, ducking and weaving your way around the rocks in the way.  This is akin to driving at autobahn speeds in downtown Calcutta.  Well maybe not Calcutta, but someplace very congested.

Again, you may ask any questions you like, except what the test number is.

Yeah, noted for the speed 5, I should have had that in mind anyway.
So a 7, hmm. Understood. Well, I'll probably under/over-estimate most of the first manoeuvrers anyway while I build a reference, so it's not too surprising.

When the Gryffin lurched, Kaya frowned slightly. She considered asking Aarav to adjust the settings on the spot, but that would be iffy at best. While she briefly wondered what Peri's own frown meant, she didn't think too much about it: there'd be time to talk about it later if needed.

When the third beacon was revealed, Kaya didn't even consider going over the asteroid field and skipping the hard part: not only she found the idea mildly offensive, but it would utterly defeat the purpose of the exercise.

“Got it,” she answered Peri while she started her run through the rocks.

So for the next one, a few questions:
Are the obstacles (mostly the rocks) visible / known well enough, or is it mostly a case of "evade one rock, see the next one, adjust trajectory to avoid the next one" and so on?
A smiliar question would be "is it possible to plan the route ahead, or is it one rock at a time?"
Are the rocks (mostly) static relative to each others or are they moving?
In simulation runs on similar courses, would it be (usually) done at ISS3 or 4 for a ship of roughly the same performances?

In reply to Kaya Wilden (msg # 39):

This course would be well charted.  You would have access to the chart on your comm.  And I could even see Kaya having flown this course before.  There might be variables if you were running with drones, but since you aren't, you can assume a decent familiarity from the scanners and prior knowledge.

Since you are you, yes you could probably plan a route on the fly.  If you stated you were doing that, I would probably adjust the test number downwards.

It is an asteroid field.  Small ones may have some movement, but mostly everything is just floating there.

I would say 3 or 4 sounds about right.  Probably more towards the 3.  I would say 4 is more about dog fighting.  But Kaya would be well trained on both speeds.

What else?

Alright, so: 6 + ISS4 - 2 = 8
I'd put the whole thing in the 7 to 9 range. It's more difficult than the "simple" flip-over, but on the other hand Kaya can plan the route to the third beacon and adjust her trajectory accordingly, and there's no real danger, so a 9 would likely be too much. I would hesitate between the 7 and the 8, and might probably lean towards the 7, but I can't get there: I would need to go to ISS3, but then the difficulty would likely be lower too, so that wouldn't solve the problem. So... Well, 8 it is.
I suppose I could say that Kaya is not planning anything to increase the difficulty but it's not how she works so...

As she went around the first couple of rocks, Kaya was already planning the rest of her route to reach the third beacon, hoping that any time she might lose at the beginning would be more than compensated by the time she'd win later on.

Plus, the faster she went, the more impressive it'd look...if she didn't mess up on the way.

In reply to Kaya Wilden (msg # 41):

You nailed this one.  It was an 8

The Gryffin slips over and around the various rocks like a well made shirt sliding on to your skin.

You hear Rokzi whistle in an appreciative manner over the comm.

"Beacon 3 tagged.  Getting vibes on beacon 4..."</orange>

Beacons 4 to 7 are fairly pedestrian.  You've flown similar turns during the early training days back at the academy.

Peri shakes her head as you are about to tag 7.  <Brown>"Okay.  This is messed up.  Beacons 8 and 9 are live.  And they're on a timer.  We have 2 minutes to clear both."

You glance at the course map Peri feeds you.  Beacon 8 is hidden in the middle of a clump of rocks in various sizes.  Beacon 9 isn't too far away from where you are now.  The trick is going to be sliding into the area beacon 8 is in, tagging it, and slipping back out to get to beacon 9.  There's also a small rock not far from beacon 8 which is going to make that turn back towards 9 tricky, to put it mildly.

Another crappy flat map


r         R          RR                  r   r     r    R
                   RRRRRR         r                              R
   r   r            RRRR               b8       R  r       RR          r    r
                                          r   R          RRRRRR
      r   R       r           r       rR         r        RRRRR

r                 r   R  R         RR       r                r
                                RRRRRRRR
                                  RRRRR     R    r      R
                                   RRR

      R      b9

r    r        r        RRR                 b7
                     RRRRRRR
                      RRRRR                              G

Cool :)
Oh and maps are pretty good actually.

While she was aware of the whistle, Kaya didn't react to it much: she was focused on her piloting for the time being, there'd be time later on to appreciate it. For now though, she frowned as she considered the next two beacons, particularly the eighth with its accompanying rock.

After a second, she decided to pivot the ship in such a way that she was going to negotiate the turn not on the ecliptic plane, but perpendicular to it: this was space after all, manoeuvring at 360° was not only possible but quite expected. It wouldn't allow her to dodge the rock entirely, but it should make it easier, particularly if she went near it on the way in, not on the way out to the ninth beacon.

I hope anyway.
So, question: does the switch of plane help? Does it allow Kaya to completely ignore the rock or not so much?
Are there any other difficulties besides the rock?
By default, without taking the plane thing, how does it compare to the one at beacon 1?

In reply to Kaya Wilden (msg # 43):

Beacon 8 is kind of wedged into a little alcove of rocks.  Think of it like a catcher's glove and the beacon is inside.

Going in from a different plane does alleviate some of the pressure, yes.

The issue isn't getting inside the little alcove.  For Kaya, it would be as difficult as a nasty parallel parking job.  The real issue is the turn back to beacon 9.  Doing it carefully will eat up a lot of time.  You would probably have to cut down to ISS 1 or 2 to hit beacon 8 and then reaccelerate to zip back over to beacon 9.

I would need to know the order and speeds you handle things.

How fast will you approach each beacon?

How slow will you go when you go inside beacon 8's alcove?

I will assume you take the easiest route in entering the alcove.

Any other tricks/questions you want to try/ask?

Thanks

Hmm, that's where it gets a bit confusing: adjusting the speed affects both the TN and my "roll" to the point where I could get some really counter-intuitive results.
Well, the die fucked me anyway: low roll plus low speed = no way to meet the TN...
So I'm going to go with 2 + ISS2 + 2 = 6

Instead of privileging the easy approach to beacon 7, with a hard turn towards beacon 8, Kaya decided to take the opposite direction: she was going to take the "harder" approach to the seventh beacon, but do it slow: she wanted to position herself in the best possible way to be able to have a clear shot to beacon eight without having to slow down past beacon seven.

In reply to Kaya Wilden (msg # 45):

Figuring the speed is part of the equation.  I think I will only use this system sparingly.  At more 'dramatic' moments as it were.

I do want to try it on at least one combat run.  But we'll finish the piloting portion here.

The TN was a 9.  But you specified taking it slow, so I actually adjusted down to a 7.  You ended up being not too far off.

You take Gryffin down a peg on speed before you enter the little grotto of asteroids and tag beacon 8.  You think you hear Peri sigh, but can't be sure.

The straight shot to beacon 9 is smooth as greasy waxed floors.

You head out of the course, returning to the starting line for Peri's run.

The prelim results of your run flash up.

Damage to ship:  1.8%

Your Run Time:  5:58

Average Run Time:  7:05

The analytics aren't ready yet, but you suspect you picked up some time by taking that beacon 7 to 8 run slow.

Peri is jacking into her comm chair.  "Very respectable," she tells you.

She starts to run through a rather quick flight check.  Very quick.

Aarav sends you the damage report.  It's fairly minor.  The usual dents and dings on the hull from small rocks.  To be expected in an asteroid field.

There was a little bit of stress on the exhaust manifolds.  That's not uncommon when you're switching between ISS's on such short notice.  Gases build up unexpectedly.  Put strain on the system.  Damage to exhaust manifolds is the common cold of fighter ships.  So you would expect to see some stress showing in a damage report.

The 1.2% here seems a tad high.  You would have expected more like .6 or .7%.

Peri thumbs her comm.  "Boil!"

Before you know what's going on she's taken off into the course.

They've changed up the beacon sites for her.  You see them pop up on your screen, now that you're playing navigator.  Beacon 1 and 2 are milk runs.  Beacon 3 is a climb straight up the side of one of the larger rocks in the belt.  Peri handles that pretty well.

She blasts through beacon 4 and 5.  Five is pretty easy.  Four was pretty tight on the turn.  Proximity alert flashed yellow for the entire time of the turn.  She got you too close to the rock.

You see beacon 6 coming up.  As you start to confirm for her...

She's coming in too fast.  To make the turn to Beacon 7, she'll have to do a hard left at the edge of the rock nearest beacon 6.  But she's going in so fast, the hard turn is going to be very tricky.  If she doesn't hit it, Gryffin will probably spin sideways into a small rock.

Peri seems to guess you might be worried.  "It'll be fine.  I got this."

“Not too shabby.” Kaya nodded distractedly as she studied the numbers. Not so much of her own performance - even though she was pleased to be more than a minute below average - but those handed over by Aarav. No damage, or at least no damage other than what was expected, was a good thing of course though she hadn't been too worried about that, but she was frowning at the exhausts stats.

In the end, she nodded, “Alright, we'll go for run two, then we'll pause for a moment while we analyse those numbers. I want to know if it's a piloting issue or something related to the ship itself.”

Though, as she saw how Peri started her run, she was wondering who was the more aggressive of the two... It certainly didn't appear like it would tell her anything about piloting styles impacting or not the exhausts' stress at any rate.

Still, while she wasn't particularly fond of the position, she performed the basic duties of a navigator, merely pointing out the beacons to Peri as she had done to her. She tried not to wince visibly on the fourth beacon, wondering if it had been a voluntary but aggressive move, or if she had tried to make the most of a mistake.

By the time they reached the sixth one, she was strongly leaning for the former however. She was briefly tempted, seriously, to take control back and avoid the accident she was seeing coming, but in the end she decided not to: she had to trust her crew. She needed them to know she trusted them. Still... “If you scratch the paint, you're on painting duty at our next stop.” She commented, trying to appear unconcerned.

Despite that, she had the hands near the controls: if at any point it seemed that there was no way Perri was going to be able to prevent the collision, she was going to take back control and try to make sure the Gryffin wouldn't need anything more important than said paint job.

In reply to Kaya Wilden (msg # 47):

Peri starts to bank...

You watch on the screen, realizing a microsecond before she misses the turn that she's going to miss the turn...

Since you're taking control, another test.

Peri is hitting this at ISS4.  She was trying to make what was essentially a 70 degree angle but didn't start counter thrusting in time, nor did she use enough thrust.  The Gryffin is going to drift wide and turn, colliding with the rock along it's back end.  Visiual would be:

                              G
                            G
                          G
                     R  G

The back end of G-the Gryffin-is swinging to the left.

Solutions I can see might be:

-Gun it.  But to do so, you'll have to cut the counter thrusters.  This would shoot you forward but you'd be going at a breakneck speed.  You'll have to dodge anything that might be in your way until you can get it under control.

-Apply pressure at the other point of the fulcrum.  In other words, start thrusters near the top, probably around the second G down.  Try to swing your nose to the right.  If you gun it hard enough, you should flip around and the tail end would miss the rock.  Barely.

In this case, I'm going to say you don't really have time to change speeds.  So you're stuck with the ISS4.

There is another option:

-Let it hit.  The rock will probably do some hull damage.  But it shouldn't be enough to cause decompression.

If you can think up another solution, go for it.  Unless you chose letting it hit, make a test or ask a question.  Thanks.

Alright, well, Kaya will try to go for the second option (the idea being that barrelling through the range full speed might be even more dangerous and I don't believe in escaping one bad situation by creating an even worse for the future to deal with...), with the caveat that she'd rather scratch the paint rather than take too many risks.

As for the roll: 3 + ISS 4 + 2 = 9

That was the difficulty I was estimating, so hopefully I'm not too far off.

In reply to Kaya Wilden (msg # 49):

It was a 7.  Normally, I would call it a 4, but the split second decision and emergency situation did ramp it up. I did say 'swing your nose to the right' when I meant 'to the left'.  But same idea.

You hit the starboard thruster hard.  Gryffin groans in a way it shouldn't, but the ship moves.  There is a brief thud.  A distant sound like someone slammed a door hard at some other end of the ship.  The proximity alert blares only for a moment.  Then the ship is clear.

"Minor impact...it dinged us.  Nothing a little buffing won't fix," Aarav chimes in.

Peri swivels around in her chair.  "I had that!"  She shuts her mouth and spins back around, and starts going for the next beacon.

She takes the rest of the course in an easy fashion.  Gunning it early on had gotten her some time.  But beacon 6 and the safety-first rest of the run cost her.  She clocks in at 6:58.

Damn, I really tend to overestimate the difficulty of things... And to make matters worse, I had that 7, snif.
My poor ship :'(

Kaya answered Aarav's report with a grumble, then harshly said “Focus!” to Perri when she turned in her direction. For the time being though, she didn't say anything else, and let her copilot finish her run, pointing the beacons in order...while trying to think of how she was going to handle that.

As it turned out, Perri was competent, but she wasn't aggressive: she was reckless. Which, she supposed, could explain some of the bad blood between her and Aarav: if there was someone who liked a ship being damaged even less than her captain, it would be its engineers. And if Peri had an history of this...

When Perri finished her run, Kaya stood from her chair and went to pick a drink, giving time both to Peri to unwind, and to Aarav to compile the data he needed. When she came back on the bridge a couple of minutes later, she looked Peri straight, “First, you'll do well to remember that this is my ship. Even if you had it, you do not complain if I take command.” She paused there, wanting to make sure the point landed strongly suspecting that she'd have to draw a line in the sand as far as Peri was concerned. “And among other things, it means that until and unless proven otherwise, I'm a better pilot than you are. Which in turn means that...”

“Second, no, you didn't 'have it'. You were missing the turn. Had I waited even a fraction of second more, we'd have impacted that rock. More than we actually did anyway. And if you're not convinced, play this through on the simulator, starting from the moment I took command. Even knowing what you know, four times out of five you're going to crash if you follow through with your first intention.”

The young lieutenant squinted, “In fact, you'll run those simulations when we're en route to Little Giant. If you do better than that, I'll admit I may have misjudged it.” Even if she was Peri's CO, she had to offer an olive branch after all. Plus, they both knew that it would be vastly easier on the simulator now but she was banking on Peri admitting to herself at least that considering how difficult it was even then, it very likely would have gone much worse had Kaya not taken controls back.

And she was pretty sure she wasn't going to hear anything about it any more: Peri might be reckless at the controls in some circumstances, but she still had to be not only good but a decent officer overall. Once she cooled down anyway. The question would be to know if she managed to do better but wouldn't say anything, or if she'd crash and burn and apologize. Kaya would have to check on those simulations: if nothing else, it would tell her more about her copilot not just as a pilot but as an officer.

“Alright Aarav, talk to me.” She finally instructed her engineer.

In reply to Kaya Wilden (msg # 51):

Peri listens to you with a tight lipped face.  But she takes a deep breath when you're done and nods.  "Understood. And yeah.  I know.  I got stupid.  I'll do the sims."

She sounds somewhat sincere.  Maybe.  You can't quite tell.

Aarav sends you a diagnostic.  The damage isn't extensive.  "We're doing a combat run, right?" he asks over the intercom.  "Why not let Peri and Rokzi prep for that and, if you don't mind, come down here to the engine room.  Might be easier to show you than try to explain."

Peri waits until you hang up the intercom and glances at you. "That's his way of saying he wants to talk to you alone.  I'll prep us for the next run."

She hails Rokzi and starts to run through the flight check.

Aarav is studying a vid screen.  He doesn't say anything as you walk up, just points at the screen.

The screen seems to show the interior of some part of the engine.  A tank of some kind.  It seems to be filled with a translucent gas.  The pressure inside the tank seems to suddenly contract and the gas shoots out when a valve opens at the rear of the tank.

"Computer.  Freeze.  Rewind 10.  And..."  He glances at you, pointing to an area of the screen>  "Watch.  Computer, resume play."

As you watch, when the pressure changes and the gas expels, part of the wall seems to bulge outwards. It's just for a moment.  But it definitely does.

"That's not the exhaust manifold.  Well it is.  But it's for that side thruster you ramped up to avoid that rock.  Not the main engine"

He sighs.  "And..no.  It's not supposed to do that.

"I didn't wanna say anything.  Especially over the intercom.  But...I had thought this when I did my inspection yesterday.  Now I'm much more certain.  The thrusters aren't the original engines.  The main engine is.  It's hard to yank out the main power core and replace it without making it obvious.  But the thrusters caan be taken off and new ones welded on.  And I think...about 90% sure...someone did that on the Gryffin.

"Problem is...well.  Anything related to an engine is tough to replace.  They're very finicky.  It has to be calibrated perfectly when the new part is plugged in.  The thrusters on us were calibrated...just not perfectly.

"I checked the registration on this ship. It was built two years ago.  It wasn't commissioned.  It was serving as troop transport in neutral zones.  It didn't see any action and all it's repair logs are clean outside of the usual maintenance and some dings here and there.

"I didn't see any reason why someone would replace the thrusters.  More to the point, I didn't see any evidence anyone did replace the thrusters.  It's not on any of the repair logs."

He shrugs.  "Not my place to wonder why all that is.  Tag.  You're it.

"Anyway.  What this means for you and Peri driving.  Whenever you guys need to use the side thrusters.  Until I can figure out a patch, don't gun it hard for longer than a few seconds.  You're fine using 'em.  Just try to avoid slamming on 'em for long periods of time.  If that manifold blows, we'll lose the thruster completely."  He scratches his jaw and shrugs.  "But I think it'll hold for a while.  The fact it bent back into shape means the plastimetal in the walls is still malleable.  We're still flyable.  Just nurse the side thrusters when you can.  And when you can't, don't lean on them any longer than you need to."

Questions?

Kaya nodded with a slight approving smile when Peri admitted she'd been stupid. She sure hoped she was sincere and wanted to make her copilot aware that she wasn't a bitch, but even if she actully weren't sincere… Well, it didn't matter all that much. When Aarav mentioned talking to her privately, she glanced at Peri then shrugged, “Well, I better go see what it is then.”

The young lieutenant listened attentively to what her engineer had to say, watching the recording - and wincing when the wall bulged outward - before finally rubbing her lips pensively. “If we ignore the problems you've noted,” she started to ask, “which I really hope you'll manage to fix…” She paused for a second there, an eyebrow cocked, obviously hoping for his confirmation, “what would those new thrusters change for the ship? I assume they'd be supposed to perform exactly as the normal ones would? Could the switch have been intended to change our signature?”

After a couple of seconds, she frowned, “Finally, could that defect have been added intentionally or is it something that was only noticed today because we went through more…extreme…maneuvers than would have been tested?”