Game #9 : Zone (1988)
Meat and Valero (if he still lives) can get to work on the new Triple-T. I'd agree with sending Rambo off to driving school.
Given that there doesn't seem to be too much resources all around us, I'm all for sending Rambo for some extra-good truckin'. If I ever have to go somewhere not on my own two feet, I prefer going with a driver who knows what all those knobs and things do, not to mention being able to handle the gun! (Guns? Other deadly implements?)
Other than that, I'd vote for supply run to that one gas station that apparently still has some hot-dogs in stock (the one in Dragor, that is), given that we seem to use fuel faster than we can plunder it. Once we get the second IFV in stock, we can start being more aggressive, but I guess with enough parts to build one we're in a not-too-bad position already?
And we could send at least one biker to keep scoutin', I guess? There's still a lot of stuff to find, apparently!
About fuel, apparently an IFV costs 75 liters by day, and a moto 25 by day.
Last period, we found 712 liters, and there is still fuel left in Cazan so that's the capacity of the iFV (minus what it used on the return trip presumably, so possibly the real value is 800 ?) I would not be surprised if "truckin" helps you carry more. Unrealistic, but it would make increasing skill level very useful. "Let me show you how to pack fuel".
In the same period, we spent :
7 days of IFV = 525 liters
12 days of moto = 300 liters
Total : 825
Difference : -113. From the report, we went -128 over the period ; close enough. I guess under the hood it counts "half days".
It also means staying positive on fuel is going to be a struggle, given the amount of gas the IFV is guzzling. A 10 days trip (so walking distance = 20) is going to be a net zero in fuel.
To be fair this calculation depends on the fuel strategy when leaving the base,.I suppose groups I am not part of take just enough fuel for a return trip, when I am part of an expedition the game asks me how much I want to pack. I am going tonight to check the maximum it allows me to carry.
Dragor will bring-150 fuel by trip compared to Cazan, more if the team decides to take food rather than fuel.
What I will do is personally hop in the IFV (allowing us to go from one place to another rather than just back-and-forth trips from home), then hit Cazan, and then once Cazan is empty (if it empties) go to Dragor and make sure we load only ? mostly ? fuel. I suspect the IFV has different storage for fuel and food, but tbc.
For the rest, as you propose. We train a new trucker, and we send scouts further North. Update tonight for sure (+ one for the squad tactics game Paras on the blog).
Apparently I'm a beautiful woman, but who knows under the robe. I was going to do a spirited speech about the need to purge the gangs before they can get us, but I guess I'm too late.
Considering that the Vault is dying and we need to find the water chip soon (I'm glad some things never change in postapoc games) I would plan for some aggressive moves. Training seems to be long, and sending Rambo to train leaves one of our 2* punching guys out of commission for a month at least. The Stinkers seems to be more targetable than the other raiders.....
I haven’t played the turn yet so the rest of the team has around 3 hours to chime in 🙂
I believe we have a chance against the stinkers outside because I broke through an unknown number in my earlier test. Without losses? Less sure. Inside the dungeon, I have no idea. They are big and I stopped my test a bit after starting exploring one.
Another round of exploration, R&R can be good. I'd vote to be in the position for a Stinker Strike for the "next round", tho. My feminine wiles hunger for the destruction of a rival gang.
Also, considering how it goes, skilling "drawing anime girls" on Tanith could get her some spiffy medal from the remnants of the French Government, if they're hot enough.
I'm not entirely sure what "Diplomacy" does, up until now we have seen a use of all other skills, I guess.
IV. Playing defence
So as planned :
- I send Rambo to train as a trucker. Given he needs to walk to Hirgael, that's 27 days without him ^^.
- I send BG and Strange to scout Urm and Sata
- I personally take the IFV with Gubison and head toward Cazan. I am offered to take any amount of fuel between 100 and 1100 liters (hundreds only), so now we know what's the maximum fuel the IFV can carry. Even though I only need 108 in fuel to go to Cazan, the game asks me to take enough for a return trip, so I have to take 300 liters. That's what we leave with.
"Bitch of a life.."
In Cazan, I find 420 in fuel. I then move to Dragor (cost : 90 in fuel), where I find 480 in fuel and 9 days of food !
I also receive 3 radio messages in a row :
- Strange is back from Urm, where he met the Babacool, a friendly tribe which can help us train in negotiation.
- BG is back from Sata, where he met the Mecanos, a friendly tribe which can help us train in - surprisingly - repairing. Unfortunately, he also reports that a group of 22 skinheads ("19 of which agressive") are also heading toward Sata. I have no idea what can happen when a friendly tribe and a hostile tribe collide.
I hope the repairing experts also have some punching-nazis experts with them
- The last one I like the least : the base is under attack by 10 stinkers ! Sadly, I must have the only keys of the "energy defence rings" or whatever it is called because it is not use in defense and instead everyone currently in the base is fighting.
Follows a long sequence showing the various characters either attacking or being on the receiving end of an attack :
It is pretty interesing nonetheless. We learn that Argyra is fighting with his PSYCHIC POWERS, that Karbon has the face of a mutant and hit like a truck, that Strange is actually a girl (she is at some point "blessée" which is the feminine form of wounded) and that Dayyalu tries to seduce the leader of the stinkers in the middle of the melee, but at the same time shoots him with a shotgun ? In any case, we can see the number of Stinkers (top-right) decreases from 10 to 7 before they leave.
I immediately head home. I had hoped to go through Tartar but it is not considered adjacent to Dragor, so I go through Cazan... where I find 420 liters of fuel again. Lazy design, sadly - I am a bit disappointed.
I receive ANOTHER call, about ANOTHER attack by the Stinkers - 12 of them this time. Here is the first minute again.
Alas, while we kill 5 of them, the battle goes even worse than the first one, and Valero is killed !
Valero collapses, unconscious
I finally arrive home. We are the 26th of March. Our gang has been reduced by one , and we have some wounded, but - silver lining :
- Strange has now 2 stars in negotiation (she tried seducing attacks during the second battle)
- Karbon has now 3 stars in punching people in the face
They both lost one arrow of health. Other characters were reported wounded but did not lose arrows, so I guess there is a HP system hidden "below" the arrows
- We have another surprise : we have an IFV ready, and a lot of fuel to use it !
52 days of food for 11 persons. 1984 liters of fuel, aka 82 days of moto or 27 days of IFV.
My hypothesis is that we had an IFV 90% ready, and the "time to complete" is when starting from scratch. We can allocate it now or wait for Rambo.
Update of the map :
[I restarted from the previous map, so I don't know where the cloud is now]
That's a lot to take in. What's our next move ?
"Dayyalu tries to seduce the leader of the stinkers in the middle of the melee, but at the same time shoots him with a shotgun ?"
SHOCKED that this didn't work! ... what do men even want these days??... sheesh
Looks like fuel and food are more or less under control for now - should we undertake a punitive expedition to teach these vagrants how to appreciate classy, beautiful women?
Quote from Gubisson on 13 April 2023, 11h04SHOCKED that this didn't work! ... what do men even want these days??... sheesh
Pellets. They want pellets. Or solid slugs, but they're expensive. The fastest way to the heart of a man is through his sternum, after all. I suggest it's time for a punitive expedition too, let's load our fighters and best psi and start the extermination. Maybe we'll find information on the Water Chip in the meantime.
The game looks flat-out chaotic, did you have any control in the remote combat or it's all automated?
Absolutely no control on the combat, and some of the sentences are ambiguous even in French.
Not much help from the manual, either.
The game can be summed up as "huge ambition, no budget" 🙂
that Karbon has the face of a mutant and hit like a truck
Well, you'd not expect me to go seduce people with face like that :shrug: and I mean, with love out of the question, there's only one place left where everything goes - war - and that's how we all ended up in the situation we're in.
I'll let that tortured metaphor go now.
Given that they don't want to leave us alone, I also vote for a punitive expedition. It seems that hitting people in the face ends up well for us, so let's go hit people in the face some more! Hopefully under the glorious leadership of our glorious leader, Lt. Scribe! (Yes, I really do want to check out the dungeon part of the game).
I'd let the bikers go scout in the meantime, we will be fine without them, and take IFV. No need to lose everybody all at once if this fails. And if only some of us die, well, at least this will solve the food problems for now!
Update is a bit slow because I had two consecutive party wipes in the Stinker's base ^^. Dungeon Crawling is HARD ! The game has a lot of unexpected & vicious features - and you cannot [really] heal...
I learn a few of the capabilities of the characters. Spoiler : It turns out that truckers are good with bazookas, and that weirdos can sometimes say if flasks contain poisons... but not always (or not when they have only 3 stars), explaining a party wipe ^^.
V. Operation Pyrrhus
So, it is time ! I send BG and Strange to scout Pengar and Carlin and we leave our base in an IFV with the following team :
- Myself
- Argyraspide
- Gubison
- Karbon
- Barbara
We first go to Tartar, where we are ambushed by a group of skinheads. I man the energetic laser ring - I won't show you that again, but even though I did a perfect defence Barbara is wounded !
We load up food on Tartar, and then move toward the final target - Hawk "land of the stinkers".
As expected :
Engine noise...
The Stinkers !
Another massive arcade combat (8x2 enemies), and Barbara wounded again ! On the other hand, Gubisson earns a third star in IFVing, which is nice.
The Stinkers are defeated... now it is time to plunder their base :
A door in the rampart. Do we take the risk of entering ?
And so we enter :
First room, map opened
We find ourselves in a empty room, with an "opening" in front and on the "left". The red passages (and later white passages) on the map are passages that need to be opened, by force or something else But we are lucky, I easily clear the rubbles to move to the room to the North. In the chest, we find a bazooka ! I have never seen the bazooka used in combat, but when I ask a character to open a door or blocked passage, they frequently use the bazooka (except Karbon, probably because he is such a strong puncher he has better chance to succeed by hitting with his first). Alas, the only character not wounding himself frequently with the bazooka is Gubisson, so I assume the "truckin'" skill is the one at play for some reason. When using a bazooka, absolutely no door resists Gubisson, whereas some doors resist Karbon).
The following room, we encounter a monster. I try to attack it but I am wounded. I then let Karbon do his job, and the monster is slain.
Here are the 3 events in a row :
We carry on, encountering sveral monsters ("Sewer horrors", "gigantic mutant fauves" and weak "abyss monsters"). We only encounter one human - or at least humanoid - "a crazy man" ["un excité"] :
Barbara triesto seduce him, but she fails and he hits her like a truck, moving her to "arrow down". So Karbon does what Karbon knows how to do, and the guy is killed. He may actually have been special, but more on this later.
We roam the complex hugging the left wall and Karbon grows weaker with each combat. At some point we find a chest with a flask, which we drink : apparently we feel better somehow, and it looks like Argyra's health increased. Later, I found another flask, but Argyra shouts "NO !". The game still proposes us to drink it, but well I don't though it enters our collective inventory
That's how I party-wiped the second time a bit ealier. I found [another] flask, Argyra did not say anything about it and half of us died by poison, including Karbon. The rest died in the first combat after that.
How did I party-wipe the first time you ask ? Same potion as the one Argyra advises us not to drink - except Argyra was already dead in that first run and I did not know the game even had poison vials !
Exploring further, we find some other chest that happens to be trapped. But it is worth it : inside we find a map of the dungeon :
The areas with dots are already explored.
I am particularly intrigued by that room in the middle left between two red (difficult) doors. I double-back there, and what do you know it is a metal door requiring a code (4 digits). No hint. Nothing I can do.
I come back from the other side. Same situation.
Meanwhile, the health of my team is starting to get really low. The sewer and the abyss monsters are all fine, but I encounter two "Denizens of the place" in a row :
"Habitué des lieux" is really hard to translate.
The first one sends Karbon to two arrows down, so I have to have to use characters that are not great in combat to fight the second one. Everyone is in poor shape, except me who still have one arrow up but can't fight..
I start to head for the exit, but we encounter another gigantic mutant fauve :
I am done with the place. No wonder they are called the stinkers given the kind of pets they keep in their base. I [F]lee the combat and the group immediately teleports at the entrance of the dungeon. Alas, not without damage :
We lost Barbara in the retreat.
We take the IFV and head home. I have the feeling that the Stinker base was not the first one we were supposed to raid.
As we return home, I have a lot of news to go through :
- First, I am informed every day that my men are healing using "antibiotics" on the way back. The effect is slow but definitely there. I don't remember plundering antibiotics, so I wonder whether the healing flask has a permanent effect. Weirdly, I tested further, and the effect does not trigger as long as the characters are in the base. It looks like they need to be in the IFV with me (probably a bug ?)?
- The scouts returned from their mission: Spare parts in Pengar, spare parts AND fuel in Carlin
- We have another return :
Tarnith is now a level 4 weirdo !
We are the 6th of April, and there is the situation :
Bad health overall, though it will very slowly recover from now, at least for Argyra/Karbon and Gubison. Emphasis on "slowly".
Known map, with updated cloud
Notebook
Reserves
Two final notes :
- In my 3 attempts to explore the dungeon, I encountered the various enemies and chest at the same place... except the "excité" guy who I had encountered only once before and not at the same location.. I wonder whether he is special, or possibly the leader of the Stinkers. If so, what happens if we sent a scout to the stinkers ?
- We don't seem to have kept the bazooka. Maybe it must be refound in each dungeon ? Another weak design if true.
Meat head hurt. So much happen...
I think we need to heal up a bit and wait for our trainees to get back before any more assaults. Sure we can scout the Stinkers, let's see if that reveals anything. Maybe check out those areas bordering the cloud.
I agree with checking the areas skirting the Cloud. And maybe check the areas near Fapisia, land of the Most Peculiar Naming Conventions.
Yes, shame the dungeons are not that fun, and that I cannot make them interactive.
Rest, Repair and Recon for the next episode, prolly tomoorw.
Alas, the only character not wounding himself frequently with the bazooka is Gubisson, so I assume the "truckin'" skill is the one at play for some reason.
My guess is that trucks ~= IFVs ~= tanks => tank guns ~= bazookas, so "truckin'" is the most relevant skill; and in the long tradition of RPGs, "or use the most relevant skill" is the standard wording for attempting something that doesn't neatly fit any other skill.
Also, told you that hitting things with fists is good enough for almost every problem in the world, guys. Psychic powers don't open doors!... For some reason.
As a proud owner of two arrows down, I'm all in for some R&R (Rest and Recuperation, let's leave recreation for one-arrow-down-time), and as long as we have guys with bikes, recon is always a good idea. I like to know what to hit with my fists, preferably out of a long list of options.
"Another weak design if true." I just chuckled off-topic as I'm reminded of that old journalism trope "Huge, if true."
"I double-back there, and what do you know it is a metal door requiring a code (4 digits)." Maybe our Level 4 psycho could try to figure this one out? but I agree it's probably too soon to go back out there. Can we assume the stinkers are defeated though? Or are they likely to regenerate?
As a NPC (non-player commenter), I just wanted to relate that I enjoy reading these comments by all of you. Just the right amount of humor vs serious discussion.
Seeing "Crom" on the game map brought to mind Conan the Barbarian's god.
VI. Rest, Repair and Recon
Not much this turn. I send BG to check the status of the stinker and take almost everyone not at two arrows up in health to an IFV tour. "Almost" everyone because "everyone" would mean leaving only Meat in defence. He can punch, but in case of Stinker attack can he punch ENOUGH ???
But tt turns out the Stinker risk has been exaggerated greatly :
Only 2 groups left, though they learned nothing. Of course, there could still be groups outside of their base, but they used to be 3 groups of 49, so either their groups are very uneven or they took some significant losses.
The IFV initially do short tourns to Cazan. Every time I arrive there or return to base, I receive the message "everyone takes their medicine", and the group gets healthier. This allows me to leave healthy people at home, which gives me the confidence to push to Dragor with return through Tartar so we have a tour with lunch AND dinner with all the food we find.
Loading in the tank of : food for 14 days [and] 600 litres of fuel
In Tartar, we are "ambushed" once by some Skinheads, but then the game tells me they don't feel they are numerous enough and they run away so no ambush after all !
I finally understand the rules for how much fuel can be carried : 1000 litres for the IFV + 100 litres by person. This either that a/ you guys are very strong and b/ you are standing on top of the IFV steadying the barrels with your arms while Gubison drives in the barren landscape of post-Conflict Britanny AND one of you is also carrying Gubison's barrels while he drives.
Rambo comes back from his training :
The Bulldozer clan did a good job. Rambo gained TWO stars in trucking, so he is now all around better than Gubison.
Strange is back to two arrows up, so he joins BG in the scouting. I send the two of them to the most distant lands :
- Sombrie : Fuel, Spare Parts and Food
- Tagh : A newcomer : the Killer clan, massive but despite their name, not very aggressive.
"The killers are grouped. They are 107 and little aggressive"
Note that "little aggressive" does not mean friendly. I have a suspicion they are end-game content and were tagged "little aggressive" so they don't kill us early. :
- They are a lot,
- They are all grouped. For other clans it said "x groups"
- They are in the region the further away possible from our home base.
On the 24th, I stop receiving messages about everyone taking their medecine. I do one last back-and-forth and can confirm, we run all out.
I don't think we repaired anything, we haven't scouted that much either, but boy did we rest :
Nice to see the return of a good puncher. BG is not here because he is on a long-range mission to Lerne. Strange is down to one arrow up so I guess long reconnaissance is bad for health.
I think we don't have a fuel / food risk anymore given outside resources don't exhaust. That's really a pity game-design wise as it makes a significant part of the game irrelevant [the game is difficulty 6 out 10 so it is not easy-mode either].
As for the known world :
New map, I haven't updated the location of the cloud but it did not move much, covering the same regions. I am frequently checking whether it left that last tiny corner of Sitia or Nork but for now it is still there.
Sorry Dayyalu, forget to scout Fapisia.
It is the 26th of April, and it is time to plan the next moves.