UFO Fanfiction Discussion

[Bomb Bloke]

Skipping time into febuary? What are you guys talking about, the fic is already in febuary. Hence that debriefing of the council of nations etc we had however long ago.

 

There's a post in there somewhere that notes Psawhn bunks with a soldier. Good luck finding it. Yes, I let the summary get out of date, but I've got excuses - I had no time, and I knew no one was reading it anyway.

 

I don't think Terrick's case will be left to the UN, and here's why - the organisation in concern is going to get the laser pistol (if I have my way ), and X-Com isn't going to be too happy to let that slide. Besides, it's a good excuse to recruit some new scientists (eg Terrick's family). Besides, firing soldiers is a tricky issue in itself, given that they have classified info.

 

He certainly isn't going to get away with what he's done so far. That guard won't be too happy, and nor will Green.

 

I thought we expecting to have Snakemen last mission anyway.

 

Concerning UFO transport;

 

https://img.photobucket.com/albums/v213/BombBloke/tm305.jpg

 

Oh, yeah... I'm back.

[The Veteran]

Snakemen eh? Personally I think its still a bit soon to be jumping into the various races willy nilly. If we're going to introduce a new one then we need to decide which one we want and make sure it's only that race for a while. We can't introduce all of the races at once even though it does happen that way in the game from time to time!

 

Forgive any spelling mistakes, this keyboard is rubbish and I'm in a hurry!

[Alitorious]

Posted by: Alitorious 29th January 2003, 12:12am

 

At exactly six in the morning, Daniel was rudely awakened, once again, by the base alarm. After realizing what it was that woke him up, he shoved his head underneath a pillow and tried to ignore the commander's voice over the PA. The flight mechanic on the other side of the scaffolding cursed, and started to get up. After hearing the light flick on, Daniel was gratefull for the scaffolding dividing the room - it was originally intended to help the scientists not keep the other roommate awake while working late on problems, but now it served to prevent Daniel's retinas from burning away. When Daniel finally did get back to sleep, his own alarm clock started blaring out barely a minute later. After grumbling to himself, he shoved his covers off and began to get dressed for the day.

 

 

And I'm thinking we should be a bit more linear and just introduce floaters instead of skipping ahead to snakemen. Perhaps the next one's a floater terror mission?

 

 

2100 knots = 3900 kilometres/hour = mach 3.2

 

 

I'd post, but I have no idea what I'd do with this Terrick thing, and I don't want to step on FullAuto's toes with what he's doing overseas (I have no idea how much you've written or planned out) and everything else kinda relies on those two arcs finishing up.

Unless, of course, you want me to stop making up excuses and just dive in and get my hands dirty, eh?

[Bomb Bloke]

Dive on in - that is the whole point. You still haven't tied up that whole motion scanner thing.

 

 

...intended to help the scientists not keep the other roommate awake...

 

Flight mechanics, you mean.

 

Ok, I'll change the summary notes. A lot of things about various characters need tweaking.

 

Sometimes snakemen do turn up before floaters, but I guess it is uncommon. I'm just waiting for the Chysallids to turn up. We'll have fun with that one.

 

[FullAuto]

Ali, I never think past guns going off, so don't worry about stepping on my toes.

[JellyfishGreen]

- I wouldn't mind bringing in Snakemen soon, when I had the Ethereal talk about their warrior races taking over from the Sectoids I was specifically thinking of Snakes/Chryssies/Mutons. If the Floaters hadn't been delivering me shiploads of elerium lately, I'd have nothing good to say about them. Maybe the Reaper would make a good scene but otherwise I say make Floaters a flash in the pan.

 

- I've been campaigning for RC tanks (not AI tanks) throughout. It handles a lot of problems we haven't yet solved in AI, especially 1999-era AI, such as target identification and communication. And it gets Worm and Slice involved. If anyone wants to send lottery winnings my way, my offer to build one still stands.

 

- Doc and Cheese, Cheese and Doc; there's lots of logistics going on that we're not writing about. Don't worry about it, we can always allude to it having happened. (After starting several games of XCOM I'm coming to the conclusion the research planning and base construction timing is what you need to study to win the war quickly, but that's another topic.)

 

Good writing, Ali, & youse other guys

[storm turmoil]

well, The engineers have obviously made a breakthrough on what the mind probe does, if you read the post, but are now barking up the wrong tree as regards the stun bombs and launcher( mainly because they havn't realised the two are related....) I did that since in-game the bombs aren't usuable without the small launcher, so...

 

as for why everyone bar David gets a headache, its because the probe has a psionic readout, so anyone handling it gets a 'psychic download' of whatever they're looking at's stats ( it doesn't need any psionic strength, it just uses a psionic readout).

 

David, following up on Fullauto's suggestion, doesn't get this because I'm shaping him to be a psionic dead zone, probably related to parts of his past.

 

and as for Terricks family coming onboard as scientists, I think we could use some more, and it'd be a nice handy way for someone to score points with Genega for handing him a viable and neat solution to the problem of civilians who know too much.

[Bomb Bloke]

There are some posts where we were building tanks that 'think' for themselves, but every time we've used them in combat they've been operatin RC style. The way I see it, relying on AI is asking for trouble, but automatic target recognition etc. doesn't hurt. Those who have the brains to run the tanks won't nessaceraly have the reflexes.

 

Cheese isn't a pilot, he's a co-pilot. So a good excuse is he isn't skilled enough for our craft, but he knows too much to send him home. Our best bet is to put him into training, or perhaps send him out with Doc in the 'Ranger.

 

Whichever alien race we introduce next will be fun, I suppose. Flying aliens = death from above, and I forgot about the Reapers.

 

Hmm... If we thought we had trouble working out how lasers, elerium and plasmas work, we're got another thing coming with these Mind Probes. An explanation will be tricky.

 

Oh, and as for the Floaters, we'll throw in a plot with the abduction craft. They tend to be nearly exclusively piloted by Floaters.

[storm turmoil]

ok, bad choice of words. lets say instead that they have a handle on how to operate a mind probe, but they won't be making any any time soon..

[Bomb Bloke]

I knew what you meant.

[The Veteran]

What the hell is wrong with you people!!! How come we have a new character, a new writer in the fic, yet still noone is writing!!!

 

Come on guys please if you're reading this just take five minutes to let me know why noone is writing this fic anymore... It's died a death... again! Let's sort it out yeah?!

[Bomb Bloke]

Generally I like to wait until two other people make a post before I do... But at this rate I am getting ready to break my rule...

[The Veteran]

so go for it! break the rule! If I post, then you post, then maybe someone else with a two post minimum will post! Then it will break the three post minimum as well! Then I can post again and you'll never have to break your rule ever again!!!

[Bomb Bloke]

Heh, give me an hour or so, by the time the night is up I'll have something done.

[The Veteran]

yay! Have it done before the evning and I'll stick in a post before I go back to work

[Bomb Bloke]

Assuming your profile is setup correctly, that gives me about five hours?

[The Veteran]

A man on the edge I see Yeah say about that and I should have time to put something together... You do know that you can write it before then tho

[Bomb Bloke]

It'd take me a bit too far into the morning if I do leave it that long. Even if I do get to sleep in tomorrow...

[JellyfishGreen]

Vet, daytimes this monthcycle are in work and evenings are in another creative project - come October I'll be able to get free of that and come in to this again - rest assured I'm still reading, anyway.

[Alitorious]

I've discovered what it means to have a workload. Three words:

University. Engineering.

Eeek.

I shouldn't even be here right now...

[The Veteran]

Gah! What's the world coming to when even I don't write in the fic myself! Back for the weekend so I'll try again.

 

Anyway! Good news is I'm getting a phoneline put into my room in the next week or so! Bad news is I'm not living there for the next month or so... Still come Xmas I'll be online permanently so you may all fear my wrath...

[Snikers]

Oh, bugger it, I give up.

 

I have wracked my brain and I stil can't think of what to write about. What do you people want? Give me an idea - Bernard, Martin, aliens out of nowhere - I don't care, just give me something to write about.

 

I can't guarantee it'll actually go up, but I'll put it on the burner.

[FullAuto]

I'll try and post this week.

[Bomb Bloke]

Things to do:

 

Alien missions - Not just yet methinks, it hasn't even been half a day since the last one. Fic time, anyway.

 

Interogations - We have a mercenary and a diplomat under lock and key, and maybe a few aliens (can't remember).

 

The mercenary knows Frank Burns, and Burns was behind Marvin's little adventure (the chopper pilot). We could link that to Terrick as well, perhaps - a good excuse to let the chopper go, while not closing the plot thread completely?

 

Aliens have thus far been known to die quickly under X-Com care, so it makes sense to try to 'interview' them as soon as possible, if we do have any.

 

Research - Daniel is still working on his motion scanner, Dana's last official task was to work on alien alloys, and Zagar, having helped create the first laser batteries, is most likely ready to move on to elerium and alien engines in depth. As it stands, we don't really have anyone dealing with alien equipment at all - we should at least work out how to make the guns fire. David Brown might be the man for that.

 

So far, none of the troopers have got to play with the alien tech yet, even though we have a good stock of it by now. I don't see completing all laser research as compulsary.

 

Pickering and Co - Sent out to do some PR re the Terror Ship in the lake... I think? That has been destroyed, but we could still do a bit of damage control over there... Or something. FullAuto, have you remember what your intentions were there? I know JFG mentioned they were supposed to go to the last combat site...

 

Ramson - The pilot Alitorious is trying to introduce. Last seen dealing heavy damage to a Terror Ship. Miles away from the current action, though.

 

Terrick - Perhaps dispite logic he's still alive, but he can't survive much else without pushing against the border of what's credible. As it stands the chopper could escape (X-Com knows there is a chopper as they have found the landing ground, but haven't got a contact on the chopper itself).

 

All the other people - Most soldiers are away from base at the moment. At least half of them are coming back in the rovers. Back before X-Com became 'operational', the fic was mostly driven along by conversations and training incedents. With a whole base and secret research faculty for them to play with, there's bound to be something for them to get into trouble with.

 

Card games with a mind probe, for example, or perhaps some plasma weapons snuck out to the firing range.

[JellyfishGreen]

Just had (and researched) an idea.

Q. How do you bring down Terrick's helicopter without firing a weapon?

A. Fly real close and activate your electronic jammer at full power.

Added benefit in that they can't send any radio transmissions while the jammer's on; drawback is there's no way to predict the effects and all aboard could still be killed in the resulting crash.

Detecting them is still going to be tricky too.