Author note three short stories and a answering review section make this chapter up
For BlueMoon and AllforMe you requested it and this how I figured out how to give you the info you wanted
Fleet Numbers
Terran federation, Earth. SICON high Command
Office Of Fleet logistics
Sometime after contact with the Citadel Council
2657GS october /25/2329 AD
Lola Ramsey sighed tiredly, as she tried to ascertain if changing the universal ship registration, to citadel standard, was worth the effort. Really she didn't see the point in even considering it. There was something like thirty thousand ships throughout the federation officially: From full military craft, to merchant marine freighters, to company held and private ownership, and mothballed boneyards.
And the Mass Effect wouldn't affect the way the fleet worked anyways. Groups of small ships or frigates as central command called them would be still called a flotilla, and would be typically arranged for scouting and patrolling groups. Larger groups about cruiser size would be organized into squadrons and would be used for defense, coordinating planetary attack groups, hunter killer patrols, and major actions. Each region fielded five fleets of cruisers, although talk of commissioning a sixth fleet for each region was being spawned due to increased membership in the military, thanks to a higher population. Soon thirty thousand ships would multiply into 50, then 75, ect. Population exploded exponentially after all.
Shaking her head, and taking a long drag on her cigarette to clear her mind, she reached over for her coffee. Taking a sip, she decided to start this process by company.
Pulling up Cherenkov Industries, the oldest shipbuilding company in the federation. First was the outdated Galileo Class A Science Vessel, produced first in 2178, and 135 meters. It had no real defense weapons and was being retired from even the boneyards, doomed to the scrapheap and museums. So it was rather quick to list. Next was the Cortez Class Recon Cruiser, designed in 2229. Fast and small at 150 meters, and lightly armed to boot. Again she was being retired, used only as training boats. Though she heard they were planning to replace her with a bigger 250 meter model.
Upcoming were the old cruisers, Valley Forge Class, created in 2230, they ranged from 400 to 600 meters, and were the first true warships made by the federation. They would be considered a cruiser by citadel standards, so she didn't have to change much, though since they were no longer in production, she doubted it would be long until they were retired as well.
Taking another drag on her smoke, she moved to the newest offering from Cherenkov, the Alesia Class Destroyers, in production since 2324 AD, 250 meters long. Considered a frigate by citadel standards, no shock there, but humans referred to them as a destroyer class anyways thanks to its armament and doctrine.
Finally there was the John A. Warden Class Dreadnought. 750 meters long, and still being constructed since 2327 AD. Hard to believe the most powerful ship in the federation, wouldn't even be considered Dreadnought class by citadel standards, but then again from what she understood, the weapons and tactics were vastly different. Citadel dreadnoughts were a big ass gun that could be used at great distance to bring death, and close up it was of relatively little use. Federation dreadnoughts were covered in guns and were meant to be the spearhead through the enemy formation, reaping death as they did so.
Considering both sides as she took a long drag, she leaned back and kicked her feet up to ponder the two doctrines. The Citadel liked their big ones as back range artillery, to pound an enemy, soften them up for the cruisers and frigates to focus their fire to finish off those without their kinetic barriers. The Federation dreads' were made to be line breakers, a literal tank to breach their formation, make a gap so that they could shatter the battle line. Thinking about it, she stubbed her cigarette butt on the ashtray. Both were powerful tools, but unless the federation could close the range, they were out classed by the Citadel's artillery. Of course, it was two different hammers to crack a nut. The plus side is the Federation dreadnoughts were much more numerous, but then that was mostly a legal issue for them with their treaty of farixen, or some such rubbish.
Lighting up a new cigarette she moved on to the rest. The worst and best ship making company in the federation. The worst because they hadn't changed their design in two hundred years. Best because they produced the most ships of any of the companies, and had sold licences to make their designs dirt cheap to civilian companies, so they were the most recognised brand out there. Terran Shipyards, because when you're naming yourself, why not make a ridiculous claim like being the literal heart of Sol's Shipmaking? The company responsible for the Rodger Young Class, and the one responsible for how fucked up the class naming system was.
The ship was good, no doubting that, but they called a 550 meter ship a frigate, even she knew that was ridiculous. Not to mention their ships had fallen into the hands of the Skinnies, the Coven, rogue/criminal forces, hell just about anybody, and it wouldn't be long until some of people from the Citadel got their hands on it.
Taking a much longer drag than usual, she rubbed her forehead in annoyance and got to work. The frigate's designs were modular, which made them good multipurpose vessels, and had been drafted and constructed in 2194. They followed that up with the Escort Frigate template in 2195, at a length of 250 meters, they changed the design from two, to three nacelles, to keep the patent going in 2230. They were just a smaller version of the first ship, so they could be considered frigates. Then there were the 400 meter Gunboat monitor ships they constructed in 2233, for planets who wanted a ship with guns, but didn't want interstellar capability, again cruiser size.
They also created the Fleet Battle-Stations, but they weren't really ships, so she didn't need to bother there. They had been trying to get the government to fund their new Roger Young for years now, the 1500 meter Star Battleship, but the government wanted numbers not size. After all they weren't the damn Citadel, whose primary weapons power relied on the ship size. Taking a hit on her cig', she spread the final documents into a pile with one hand.
Happy to be done with the worst company, she moved onto one of the newest federation ship providers. Pantheon Ship Builders, created by employees of Terra's Shipyards who got sick and tired of building the same damn thing, and decided to do the exact same thing only not as boring. They had tried to supplant the Roger Young with the Athena Class, having the same modular design in the beginning. But then the bug war started, and they changed the designs to be more purpose built, but with the same aesthetic. Finishing her second cigarette in just as many minutes, her office room had become smoky and hazy, like some fucking noir novel.
The first Athena to come out was the 600 meter Armored Cruiser in 2321, the conversion had led to the only broadside ship in the fleet, but since she had the biggest guns, she was very useful. The citadel equivalents would consider her a cruiser of course, so no big change there. Their next ship was the 850 meter Super-Carrier template in 2326. Able to carry fighters, bombers, and soldiers, it had some of the best sensor and communications systems, and was often used as the flagship. She wasn't sure what the citadel specs would consider it, since it wasn't a cruiser or Dreadnought. Inhaling deeply with her cigarette, she mused that perhaps the aliens would have to make a new ship class.
Finally there as the 550 meter Battle Cruiser designed in 2327. Not much to talk about for this one, as she transcribed the length and class to the Citadel standard for the squid heads. The Battle Cruiser was just another ship in the grand scheme of things, and another cruiser. They also wanted to build a big ship, something like a 2200 meter Command Cruiser, but that was a pipe dream, stupidly expensive, and just plain stupid, "Yeah, hey! Shoot this very big target that is so very obviously very important." Chuckling she smiled, 'Fuck yo' grammer.' she thought blissfully, letting her smoke burn while she held it between her lips.
Man she must be getting more bored of this by the second. Moving on as she removed her cigarette from her mouth, breathing in some more fresh air, she looked onto the last group of ship builders. Technically speaking that was all of the federation controlled ship companies, but one of the companies that had been providing the lasers for all these ship had recently stepped into the ring. Yini-Mina Precision Devices had crafted the Ryuho Class Battleship, and at a full kilometer in size, it would be considered a dreadnought by the Citadel. Yini-Mina constructed it with their own funding in order to show the usefulness of it to the fleet. About how powerful a few big ships could be, and if it was successful, they had lined up a smaller version of it called the Hunter-Killer Cruiser 200 meters shorter. Who knew what else they may come up with, but they seemed like they were preparing to take a place with the other three companies by force.
Of course Terran naval combat had shifted away from large ships since before the second world war. Battles were won by the person with better field presence, numbers, and tactics. Typically through the deployment of fighter sized craft. She could see the place of the Ryuho in the fleet as sniper artillery, like the Citadel Dreadnoughts, but they would be a resource soaker, when they could just crew a fair few more ships instead that did the same job.
Finishing off her last cigarette she reviewed the files, tapping the ash from her smoke into her ashtray, as she checked for errors and began to give her stamp of approval on the documents, shoving them up the chain of command.
Going over the aliens ships could wait, right now, she had to tackle one jar of worms at a time… "Fuck! I need to get out of this office already!" She loudly complained.
Arena Of Revenge
Serpent Nebula, Citadel, Presidium, Laser arena 2657GS July/8/2329
Erica dodged a blue taiser laser as it arced over her head, "GOD DAMN YOU MAGHERNUS!" She screamed in impotent rage. All she wanted to do was beat the shit out of the guy who ripped her arm off, instead she had ended up in this stupid arena, facing that ass hat, and four of his Klandathu surviving fuck-buddies. This wouldn't be as embarrassing if she could've convinced any of the Mobile Infantry garrison to team up with her, but of course no one was interested in taking on the fleet engineer and his pals. So the only guys loyal enough to her were her captains, and few members of her ships crew, thank god Maghernus promised that her rank wouldn't be in jeopardy. He had wanted to make a point that the Terrans could be civil and solve their problems affably.
Everything went well at first, they had traversed three fourths of the way to their flag then they had been ambushed, and lost one of her crew to the laser taser. Pulling back into another trap, the destroyer captains and been shocked out.
Now the last of her squad was pinned down by the enemy in a cul de sac. The god damn survivors were too good to fight fairly, the years fighting for their life against bugs had resulted in some of the best troopers Erica had ever met. And fuck from the way the crowd were cheering, they were enjoying this one sided fight.
"Ma'am! I don't want to be tazed like this! You got any ideas?!" Lieutenant Lorraine, the other member of her party, asked, yelling out as he blind fired his rifle.
"Well I got one idea but you're gonna have to help me walk afterwards." Erica said peeking out and nearly taking a taser round.
Jake watched though his snooper from the flag watchtower. He was really not a fan of this whole stupidity, but he had to hand it to Maghernus, if it kept them from getting real punishment he was all in. And the bonuses for his reputation would be awesome! He would be glad when it was over, and he could get back to his date with the twins.
Well, okay he didn't know if they were twins, but goddamn he was not going to miss a chance to get laid! He'd been celibate for seven goddamn years! He wished he'd never gone to that god damned planet, things had been going good for him before it, he was not in jail, he still drank too much but he'd gotten himself a girlfriend too, god he missed Anny.
Annette Lorenzo had been a fleet girl he'd been dating before the invasion, he tried to look her up when he got off that hell hole, but her name was common enough that he was forced to look her up by ship, and he found out her ship went down about six months after the invasion all hands lost. It hurt, but this was war, everything was painful, and he was content to drink and fuck his pain away. And kick that Commodore's ass!
Looking through the snoopers, he saw someone stick their foot a little too far out, his boys acted fast as the wind, with a zap the owner of the foot fell over, and only one enemy was left standing. his men decided to charge the hold out, knowing they would take losses but secure the win. At least that's what should have happened, but his vets were shot down as they rounded the corner, a moment later he saw one of Erica's troopers helping the one legged girl walk.
"Nice catch. But you got lucky there." Jake said, applauding Erica's counter ambush. putting down his snoopers he picked up his gun and walked down the ramp. He was going to give her the fight she wanted so much.
Erica hopped along with the help of Lorraine, she tried to put weight on it but the mechanics were all locked up pretty good, meaning she had to limp everywhere. Looking around she wondered where Jake was, he hadn't been with the others, which meant they still had to keep their eye on the lookout for him. He could be waiting in ambush again.
Rounding a corner, Jake was standing unabashedly in the center of the road, and fired at the pair. Lorraine pulled them back just in time as red lasers streaked by.
"Come on out and pla~ay Erica! There is only two entrances to the flag, and I can get to each much faster, so let's end this now and get this over with." Jaked called from around the corner. "Old western style!" Unslinging his rifle he smiled wide.
"Thanks for the idea." Erica whispered then motioned Lorraine to leave her and find the other entrance. Leaning against the wall, Erica looked around the corner, "Hey Jake ever done a old time gun fight?" She asked wanting to keep him here.
"Maybe once or twice on Klendathu. Throw your rifle around the corner and I'll throw mine as well. and we can have it." Jake called back.
Limping around the corner, Erica threw her rifle down. Both of them had their hands hover over their sidearms.
"Well it's better than letting you pin me down." Erica called back.
Maghernus from his seat with the other ambassadors smiled. Lifting up a microphone he got on his best announcer voice, "Looks like we got an old fashioned duel!" The spectators cheered. "Three... Two… ONE! Draw!"
In the brief few seconds, a lot happen. With lightning swiftness, both persons flipped their pistols from their holsters. They fired simultaneously, and both were true with their rounds, convulsing and shuddering as they were electrically shocked, both fell to the ground.
A few seconds later Lorraine came around to the other Red base entrance, ran up the ramp, and began to wave the captured flag. The cheering was deafening. As victory was made for Erica's Blue team, everyone's armor unlocked and they were allowed to rise. Everywhere the camera drones were recording every second of victory and defeat.
When the pain subsided Erica pulled herself up, "Okay, let's never talk about this, ever again."
"Agreed." Jake commented helping her up. Now both standing, they shook hands in mutual friendship and hatred, before moving towards the exit. Maghernus smiled as he watched the crowd cheer and clap. Looking to the Krogan emissary to his left, Sarbon Hurr, he chuckled, "I hope you found that most entertaining…"
BloodRaven: Sooo….. I didn't realize he made this, not until like a week ago. So I was very happy to see this! The fight was just supposed to be a one off joke anyways. :D
North West Terran Federation Territory, Drapus, Ironside Street, May/26/2329 AD
Colonel Roza Bereza pulled out her compact Brunham Reaper Pistol, and took up a position on the side of the club's door. The eight men of the pathfinder squad took up positions on either side of the door with her, or at the other entrances. The people outside were backing away at the sight of the black clad SICON officer, though one civilian was recording them with a video camera for some reason. Roza carefully extended her mind into the room trying to get an idea of what and who was inside the room.
She could sense a few people inside, and at first glance they would appear human, but once you knew who you were dealing with you could tell who was what. The Coven always had a snide, holier than thou attitude, and that worked in Roza's favor, there were only four humans inside the main room, maybe more further in, as for the coven there were four on the stage and two working behind the bar. Tasting their emotions she didn't detect suspicion or worry. Yet.
Grinning widely behind her face mask, she signaled to the squad. When they were ready, she moved in front of the door, and using her suits augmented strength, kicked the door off its hinges into pieces, and shot a bikini clad dancer on the stage.
Sergeant Adamić next to her shot the other stage girl with his assault shotgun, turning the coven into ribbons of meat before she could react. As their bodies headed for the ground, their skin, or what was left of it, turned blue.
The pathfinders wasted no time entering the room, shouting for everyone to get down and knocking tables over for cover. The other two coven on the stage ducked for cover on the opposite side of the stage. One of the pathfinders moved to gun down the two hiding behind the bar when the bartenders popped up with mind blast rifles. The multi-colored beams burnt though his suit in a moment, and burned out his brain leaving him a vegetable.
"Well this is just great, they got Covie weapons! I thought they would have federation weapons!" The pathfinder corporal complained, as he readied his LMG, and proceeded to shred the hardwood bar and blow apart the two coven.
"Two down, two to go." Roza mused with a dark chuckle, peeking out of cover where she had last seen the strippers. Something black moved out from cover, but upon tasting its intent, something about it didn't feel right, and Roza had to stop herself from leaning out of cover to shoot it.
One pathfinder did and he was greeted by the smiling face of a coven, taking a shotgun blast to his face, the trooper fell back into cover, the pellets having lodged in his armor and helmet, damaging it but he was otherwise okay, if that had been Roza she would have a closed casket funeral. "Well fuck this." Roza cursed. 'Time to get creative.' She thought.
Focusing her mind, she sent a out a wave of pain throughout the main area of the club. Without mercy or distinguishing of target, everyone: the pathfinders, the civilians, the coven, all screamed out in extreme pain, as they felt intense but non lethal pain. This created an opening for her, running and jumping onto the stage, she executed one coven, and pistol whipped the other so hard she felt something break and the coven fell unconscious. Looking around she saw that the stage had a hidden hatch with weapons inside, they had been prepared for an attack.
The Pathfinders were well trained, well drilled infantry, the best of the best, they didn't voice any complaints, but she could feel their stares and taste their anger.
"I apologize, Troopers, but we can't afford to be bogged down." Roza declared, stepping back and showing the pathfinders the weapons cache under the stage.
Their heavy weapons specialist whistled low in approval, "They've been preparing for this eventuality, me think's."
"What are you waiting for you fuckers? Secure the area, Bravo team secure the exits and make sure no one gets out without being cuffed and loaded!" Sergeant Adamić ordered out before getting next to Roza, "Where did they get all this gear? I thought we had this planet under strategic lockdown?" He asked to Roza as an aside, while the team started to spread out and gather the civvies and their prisoner.
"Black market for sure. The local garrison doesn't have gear of this quality or make. And age, fuck some of this is a century old at least." Another pathfinder, their weapons specialist, proposed as he got in the little cache and pulled out an old single shot grenade launcher, "Hot damn ma'am! I haven't seen gear like this outside of museums and collectors! Can we keep them? Oh fuck is that a China Lake?!"
"Could be the Lagoom Cartel. They've been known to smuggle weapons in these parts." A female pathfinder suggested as she pulled out a Morita carbine from behind the bar, "They also got mental disruptor rifles, implying they got outside supply from their superiors. I'd keep an eye out for booby traps boys, these sneaky gits have had plenty of time to lay them, and I'm sure they would have no problem blowing this place sky high if they deemed it necessary."
"Well shit," Adamić cursed, "that means we could be facing anything, from morita rifles to power suits."
"It doesn't matter," Roza regained control of the conversation, "we have a job, and the blue bitch in charge of this shindig is in the back office, and I sense there are at least least four more coven and... something else between her and us."
"Something what?" The pathfinder with the broken helmet asked, as he removed the now useless covering.
"I think they're humans, but their minds are... altered... Shit. Okay, non lethal if you can help it. Stun 'nades and batons." Roza ordered, and everyone readied their stun batons and added shock Bayonets to their rifle lugs.
When everyone in the club main room was ready, and the outer guard reported all clear, they began to move toward the back of the stage into the already secured dancer's prep room. From there they saw a hallway deeper into the club's store room and to the offices.
As they were entering the halfway, two coven leaned around doorways further down and fired at them with mind blast rifles, forcing the group to dive into side rooms and offices. Roza screamed in frustration, the longer they were here, the longer the Bitches had to escape. Getting back to her feet quickly, she heard gunshots from the other rooms. Using her powers she pushed out in all directions, and found a Coven hiding in the shadows. The coven leapt, and tackled her to the ground and grappled Roza's pistol, "Your mind is mine!" The Coven declared on top of Roza, steadily applying more of her body weight downwards.
Roza smiled, "No, it's not." Focusing, she smiled even wider behind her mask, then she mentally struck right into the covens mind. The covenant screamed in pain and terror, the image of Roza smiling daemonically printed right in her mind. She fell back, blood pouring from her nose. If she been human or skinnie, that would have killed the blue woman, but a covenant's mind was meant to take that kind of abuse, but not the kind a pistol round to the noggin brought. As the coven laid in a slump on the floor, blood and brain matter splattered across the back wall, Roza made her way to the hallway to see how the rest of the witch hunters had done.
The coven that were firing from the hall were dead, either shredded by LMG fire, or smoked out by grenades. A pathfinder had emerged from one room covered in rich crimson blood, most not his own. There was a chunk missing out of his side, "They had two light armor soldiers in there acting like guards. I took a shotgun to the side." He muttered to the squad medic, as she got to work bandaging him up.
Mika, the Squads criminal intelligence officer from before, came out of another room carrying the head of a coven by her hair in one hand, her bloody machete in the other, "Damned kučka tried to mind game me, don't they know that we've been trained for this?"
"Probable don't know you are pathfinders." Roza supplied as she did a head count, "Or they don't give a shit. They do look down on us all."
No human casualties, the few humans thralls that were found had been incapacitated. The rest of the pathfinders made their way out of the other rooms reporting no contact, and Roza could confirm no more were hidden.
That meant they only had their leader, and that other mind. And the final room to clear was the Boss' office, "Perimeter team, send two soldiers to breach the roof of the main office, Hunters, SBC 5-5, stack up on the door. Breach and clear, we're taking them all alive." No sense in playing fair and obvious. They would breach the roof with a thermite charge and at the same time they would breach the only entrance and then a wall to complete the crossfire.
In less than a minute her pathfinders were in place, planting small charges on the door, wall, and roof, Roza counted down before pulling the clapper and detonating the charges. Mere milliseconds after the door was blown open, Flash bangs and concusion grenades were tossed in as well.
The roof also was blown apart and more stun grenades were dropped in and the side also threw in more. Simultaneously half a dozen Pathfinders rushed in and fired up their stun batons and tasers. When the gunfire culminated in a Pathfinder being launched out of the room, Roza knew something was up. Entering the room with the Sergeant, she saw the missing Investigations agent being held in the tentacled arms of a monster, a blade against her neck, five unconscious pathfinders laid about the room like a wild party had occurred, and next to the multi tentacled beast sat the head covenant infiltrator, rubbing her eyes numbly as she was trying to recover from being hit with enough flash bangs to given an epileptic a seizure.
Her eyes remained closed, and Roza could feel her power swish around like a tongue to locate her enemies, "So you terrans were smart enough to have backup after all," the Leader paused to rub her eyes again, "such a shame, I was really beginning to like this planet." Roza could tell that the leader, while dazed, blinded, and deafened, was still a force to be reckoned with alone.
Roza raised her reaper and aimed it at the covenant, "Oh I wouldn't try anything if I were you." the coven warned, her power's focus entirely on Roza, licking at the peripheries of her vision, taking all her power just to keep it out. the tentacled beast pushing the blade closer to the catatonic Lilith's throat, "My friend here might just slip and kill my new pet."
Roza lowered her pistol slightly, and the other pathfinder followed suit, "Looks like we're at a temporary impasse. So what do you want here witch?" She smiled cruelly, signing with her hand to Sergeant Adamić.
"What do I want? Well that's easy I want to walk out the front door, simple as that, but I know you won't let me. Or you will just post a sniper to shoot me as soon as I step out the front door. So here's what I need, everyone but you miss SICON Special Service Agent, to leave the room, then we will have a little talk." Raven said lazily pointing her hand at Lilith, "Or I will give your agent a new breathing hole."
Sergeant Adamić signed back,
"Are you nuts I'm not doing that." The blade lightly cut Lilith's throat, drawing blood, but not enough to harm her, but it made her point, "Here's a counter proposal, you disband the Nightmare, put your hands up, and allow me to take you prisoner. OR, we riddle both you and your pet Nightmare full of holes and we fix up Lilith the old fashioned way. There is no situation where you come out on top of this." Murderous intent expanded from Roza's mind, and Raven's psionic presence recoiled ever so slightly in alarm.
"I'd rather-" Raven started, but she was cut off by being shot by three tasers, and her pet nightmare was then riddled full of bullets, it's immaterial form taking damage, but not before it slit Lilith's throat on impulse. Oh well, they had medicine for that.
"Fuck you!" Roza screamed and laughed maniacally as she emptied her pistol's high powered bullets into the monster, before reloading and emptying it again. The pathfinders spent four minutes trying to bring the mental beast down with continuous gunfire, keeping it busy long enough for Roza to pull the bleeding Lilith out of the room. Since Nightmares didn't obey the laws of nature, it was especially hard work, but eventually the monster fell apart and dissolved into thin air.
Roza would've cheered if she wasn't helping keep Lilith alive after she had lost a huge amount of blood. Three of the pathfinders went and secured the unconscious coven.
"Mission success!" Roza declared, laughing as she got confirmation that Lilith would survive, even if she would need to get mind wiped.
"Uhh ma'am… This Witch is a body double." One of her Pathfinders explained. Looking back, the former leader now turned from an average sized covenant, into a dark skinned unconcious teen. "We found a hidden passage behind the bookcase. But by now she is long gone."
Roza's eye twitched, a vein popped, and every single person shivered in fear at her anger, "Then find her! We aren't letting that bitch escape!"
Author notes
If I get less than 5 reviews. I probably won't do this.
orion0905 chapter 16
Hello lord foul.
Fun chapter, I think you're forgetting something with ME guns, heat. The ammo would have significant heat when it impacts. Ask the waste energy gets displaced in terms of heat with something slowing down from supersonic to zero in impact. At the very least there should be pressure waves.
I'm not saying they would be super powerful, heck in the book and roughneck chronicles standard issue marauder armor is good for orbital drop. (I know they have drop pods so that helps with the heat displacement). I still place the Morita well above anything the ME races weapons. Or am I completely wrong here.
Great chapter, awesome space battle. I can't wait for more.
L4
mhmm where the numbers for a basic Morita rifle 7.62mm munitions and accuracy at ranges in excess of 1,000m, it says something here that basic sounds like it half standard chemical propellant rifle half rail gun rifle.
Bloodraven
Keep in mind 7.62 is .30 cal ammo, typically used for LMGs.
For ME guns, yeah it has heat, but it's going against something that lives in the desert/space/ect where it has to deal with just as bad weather conditions or raw unadulterated radiation. And keep in mind while it's moving at supersonic speed, so is a regular bullet. But you do bring up a good point. And Lord Foul has something to say for clarification that I totally agree with.
Lord foul:
I'm not saying either side has better weapons 100% of the time either way, that's an argument that could get diehard fanboys and fangirls arguing for days with no headway, but the ME guns do have their place and are pretty damn effective in their niche, especially when you use them with an omni tool to configure the ammo to the needs of the current battle, or even the current moment of the current battle. I had times where in one fight I'd switch between incendiaries to radioactive to armor piercing to ice rounds, it's trivially easy if you have the equipment with their guns and gun accessories, and an armor piercing round could penetrate several meters of concrete.
Lu Bane Na chapter 15
You have got to expand on that soldier's theory of the planet being a living entity that hates everybody. It would be beyond hilarious and throw all religious groups for a loop.
L4
Ah i'll make shorty story sooner or later
BloodRaven
I'm happy someone found it amusing, not my most original idea, in fact it spawned from L4 making a joke that the planet must actually hate them. I just expanded on that to imply that it actually is true. If you want a story where this is a big thing, check out the Imperial Guard novel Death World, That's where I will be getting some inspiration for helping with the short story.
Lord Foul
I also find it funny without needing to poke fun at religions :P
EvilTheLast chapter 16
Good updates. (Finally got around to reading the last few updates). I wonder what stupid thing Grand Admiral Tel'rock is about to do. Opening a new gateway into the unknown may end up with...probably with something nasty and not the Turians.
L4
He is from the Skylian Verge, I think I've already stated first contact goes bad there.
BloodRaven
Actually yes, we implied heavily that it was doomed to failure.
Lord foul
we may never see him alive again
JC chapter 16
Excellent work, Can't wait to see what happens Next.
Maybe have the Council talk about trying to double the Terrans ships.
L4
Have a section and talk about the Council trying to arm up in case of war? If it's needed I'll write it.
BloodRaven
The Council already triples the Federations in numbers. and we said in the early council scenes that they were making plans for increased ship production thanks to the Arachnids.
Lord foul
hmm it would make sense for them to increase their R&D budget for weapons and increase war production.
iyaerP chapter 16
I am quite enjoying your fic, there are just a few problems I have noticed. You tend to fail to use the correct forms of they're, their, and there, and you have a tendency to have homophones of the word you actually mean. This is the kind of problem that stems from using an automatic spell checker without actually checking to ensure that the results are what was intended. I recommend you acquire an editor so that your fics can have a more professional and polished look to them.
L4
I'll try and be better
BloodRaven
If thats the earlier work then it's my fault for rushing through it. If it's for later work. *Pulls out shotgun* I'll need to work harder than! Good news however! We have picked up two new editors. Lord Foul and spacewolflord! So hopefully these things will be less problematic.
Lord foul
I'm working on it ok, not a miracle worker :P
aso I've been busy at work lately, but that's mostly cleared up for now so woo
Poliamida chapter 16
I'm having a ton of fun with this! I did watch the first and 3rd movie and have some vague memories of a cg animation but I didn't read the book or other source materials, so the skinnies and other aliens caught me by surprise. The Starship universe seems to be more interesting than I originally thought.
It's so refreshing to read a more, lets say, reasonable first contact.
A WH reference? Ha! I knew that Ollanius Pius wasn't a random name!
Keep it up
L4
RAVEN!
Well the door was left open in the book that there may be more aliens out there and Mongoose publishing wanted to compete with warhammer 40k, and after it stopped production there was a lot fan content out made giving us the Fourth Republic, the Coven Expeditionary Force the Cyber Demons/Zombies from game canon, and the Smugs from Fan Canon.
BloodRaven
I watched all three movies when I was like 15 and younger. I have been doing a lot of research and I plan on actually making a chapter ending essay on thoughts and deconstruction of the actual Starship Troopers Universe. I also plan on reading the book since it seems interesting, and is actually required reading for several branches of US military service.
Ollanius Pius, the patron saint of the Imperial Guard. Fitting name I must say.
Lord Foul
So far I've found the book is the best of the franchise, I'm on the CGI now
Templarsith chapter 16
I think the Krogen were studied and the big boss too one look at the report, then said o good we get lots of Krogens that they needed to wage war vs the bugs. Then after the war they could not change their stances on the Krogen race as they were war heroes. Then it bit them in the ass, to be honest while the big boss are smart they tend to make choices that favor today and not the marrow. As in the game you see them make choices without asking the experts or looking at the long term effects.
This is the real reason why I wrote this review. Its a idea that I thought of that would make you guys smile. Why have a mass effect shield on the outside the mobile infantry armor? Add it to the inside of the armor then all the lucky shots would not ping around in the amour killing the soldier. Also this would allow the armor to slow all the penetrating shots reducing the amount of force the mass effect shield would have to bleed off. Well I thank you for writing this great story please keep up the great work.
L4
Interesting might use that
BloodRaven
Its insane that someone didn't say, "Hey I know you are awesome and heroes, but you should try and control your numbers until we get another war since you breed very quickly." It just seems something that while advantageous in a war, would be problematic in peacetime. Keep in mind this is coming from a Federation soldier, someone who believes wholly in sacrifice for the greater whole, if the krogan had to sacrifice some freedom to control their numbers, she wouldn't see a problem in it war hero or no.
That's a possibility, if the ME shields weren't expensive, but they very much are, and suddenly buying say 100 million Kinetic barrier shields would drive the prices up to an unacceptable amount. The Federation Military numbers in the billions of both combat and noncombat troops. But nothing's stopping SICON from doing research into the feasibility of them, and I already estimate that they would be outstanding for Light Troopers and Police forces who are more vulnerable to solid slug fire from rebels/criminals. But keeping in mind that they are fighting bugs who use fire, plasma, poisoned/corrosive stingers, and brute force to kill people, it won't be that useful for them. Then we get involved with the crazy exotic weapons all the other factions use… Eventually it just doesn't make as much sense to outfit everyone with it, if at all. They would likely go the Citadel Council path of just outfitting specialist, commanders, commandos, ect. And allowing their soldiers to buy the better gear on their own time (Something that more than a few militaries, both 3rd world and 1st world, actually allow.)
TL;DR Don't worry, they're working on it. :)
Lord foul
I figure they did tell them such and the krogan leadership told them where to stick it. Look at wreav as a typical krogan leader and wrex as an exception (though I will say I love the guy he's not common)
I figure that they'll put the kinetic barriers on the Aces, but they're too expensive to immediately put them on everyone, maybe later they'll trickle down…. hmm maybe they could configure them to work on slower moving projectiles…. be more difficult on the liquid corrosives, the plasma and the fire, but would be pretty easy to program them to stop the stingers
something to look into.
BlueMoon chapter 16
Great, I can't wait for the Next update.
Starship troopers can work in Other sci-fi series sometimes, they get teleported in and other it a fuse.
Like in Star wars Terra is in Wild space, there's no bugs, they meet the republic 5 or 3 years before the Clone wars.
L4
had that idea myself back when i was working on stargate starship troopers cross. To that I say run with it hell I help with the idea bouncing, can't do it myself though having too much fun here
BloodRaven
If you do such a premise, just make sure you get an editor to help you, and make sure you do what you love.
Lord Foul
Some universes mesh well others don't. I've always found the "poof you're in another universe" thing to be lazy writing myself, so you gotta make sure they mesh.