Caltrops - Rants





	[quote name="Caltrops Kids Club"][quote name="Electronic Arts & Zseni"]The year is 200X and space roils with the movements and battles of solemn, gigantic, and magnificent factional starfleets. Suddenly rumors are everywhere about the <i>past</i> - the past can never be changed, so they say, but can it be... brought back to life? Why do so many of the Hilarious, Sulky, and Histronic ships seem to be constructed, at least in part, from some sort of mysterious shared trauma in all their pasts? And what does it mean to ships being constructed now by all three factions? Alien Demise Technology is the first sequel-prequel expansion pack (SPEP) in gaming history, in which the events prior to the game are violently inserted and endlessly obsessed about in the present game. MoS8 players who demanded a Histrionic Archcannon to "balance" the game will find that they have more than they bargained with: an end to all beginnings, and a beginning to all ends, for this Archcannon, along with many of the other expansion ships, trawls silently in the void under the certain and <i>dangerously psychotic</i> impression that everyone is out to get it... HISTRIONIC ARCHCANNON DUAL POLARITY TIMESLAYER ARCHCANNON Senor Barborito HP: ? Attack: ? Defense: ? Genius: ? Charisma:? Special Abilities: - Symbiont Curse: the Barborito never travels without its Symbiont, which sits in the path of its attacks to delude combatants as to the source of all his attacks. - Timesink: Ships attacking Barborito see him taking damage when in fact he feels nothing. All turns spent attacking SB are lost, lost forever, never to return. - Timeslayer: SB can <i>annihilate the universe</i> if he feels threatened. Or bored. Or whatever. On a Timeslayer attack all ships find their experience wiped to 0 and the game wipes to the desktop. Hyper Mode: SB promises to return (to/-) the past. SB's hyper mode can only be activated if the every other ship in battle is also in hyper mode. MOMMY AND I ARE ONE SYMBIONT DESTROYER Veronica Team: Histrionic HP: 1 Attack: 0 Defense: 0 Genius: - Charisma: - Special Abilities: - Defenseless Flak Vest: Veronica simultaneously shields SB from all actual harm and never commits the desperate suicide or murder-suicide any other sane spaceship would be driven to. - Sheena: Widdles endlessly about a dull past spent dumpster diving and performing minor feats of parental annoyance instead of fighting or even just getting out of the way. Hyper Mode: Attaches herself to other ships, drags them down, and marries them. <hr></hr> EXPANSION PACK SHIPS ARTILLERY CRUISERS: Attack, attack, attack! Then cruise, cruise, cruise! RIFLEMASTER CRUISER E. L. Koba Team: Hilarious HP: 400 Attack: 16 Defense: 16 Genius: 3 Charisma: 15 Special Abilities: - Veteran Unit: attempts to capture a position from Koba will be in vain. (50% attack bonus on home terrain) - Deployment Sympathy: counter-aligned units are slow to attack poor ol' battle-scarred Koba (2 turn loss before opening hostilities) Hyper Mode: Koba gains War Guilt, an attack which bitterly wounds LIEBERALS. PAD THAI CRUISER Lizard_King Team: Sulky HP: 10 Attack: 9 Defense: 11 Genius: 3 Charisma: 10 Special Abilities: - Chicken Legs: LK just keeps running into dumb fights, then presenting a tempting, plump, juicy little target. - Tan Hero: LK benefits from the reputation of war service, but stays out of range of most projectile fire. Ultraviolet radiation attacks instantly penetrate his armor. Hyper Mode: LK gains Bulldog, an attack in which he just won't let an opponent go no matter how severe his own injuries are. CLOCKWORK ORANGE CRUISER Chairman Mao Team: Histrionic HP: 180 Attack: ? Defense: 8 Genius: ? Charisma: ? Special Abilities: - Mirror Cloaking: Mao cloaks during most battles. His cloaked form is as vicious and whiny as the enemies he's attacking, very dangerous for ships with high attack and low defense. (Mao mirrors the Attack, Genius, and Charisma stats of enemies he attacks.) - Contempt Of Sport: Successful attacks on Mao have a chance to automatically drive him into a new cloaking form or away from the battlefield entirely. New cloaked forms may take a while to discover, if they ever are. Hyper Mode: Mao gains a + 5 Defense boost long enough to slaughter the nearest enemy. This was used to great effect in the historic Mao vs. Junior Allen (a defunct ship type) battle. MORAL HAZARD CRUISER Ray of Light Team: ? HP: 250 Attack: 15 Defense: 15 Genius: 15 Charisma: 15 This special ship is available to all factions. All Rays in play look exactly alike and all will announce to the player on mouseover that it is on the player's side. There appears to be a mysterious connection between Ray and the Veronica symbiont... hmm... probably nothing... Special Abilities: - Irrelevant Rage: with this status field attack Ray draws the attacks of powerful enemies into a red herring vortex and away from the actual fight. - Ponderous Grip: Ray plans out all moves well in advance and follows the playbook to the letter despite shifting conditions. This has the effect of speeding his attacks against enemies with slow and predictable attack patterns and halving his defense against swift fighters. - Call of Cthulu: Ray's presence on the battlefield inclines other ships to join the fight, except for the Zseni, which leaves in an enormous huff as soon as Ray shows up. Hyper Mode: Ray gains Public Approval, a charisma boosting attack that he applies to himself repeatedly. Who knows why. LAUNCH FIGHTERS: Are they one-hit wonders or not? These dangerous tactical single-pilot ships often hit surprisingly hard, though much more often they need to get scraped off someone's window. WAFFLE CRUSHER FABIO Team: Sulky HP: 150 Attack: 8-16 Defense: 10 Genius: 10 Charisma: 9 Special Abilities: - Legendary Wiffer: In its testing and combat simulation, FABIO misfired frequently and brutally, and not even the best intelligence could cover it up. Ships in battle against him are always surprised when he hits anything at all. (Once FABIO makes a success hit on anything, FABIO gains +5 to genius and charisma for purposes of calculating attack. They do not count in defensive maneuvers or negotiation.) - Cloud Of God Mode: FABIO has a chance to waylay attacks of large shps in Time Loops, in which they go back and have some old argument <i>again</i>. This may look, to ships out of the loop, that FABIO is in some way making pertinent attacks, when in fact he is just avoiding further injury. Hyper Mode: FABIO enters Hyper Mode after winning a battle, receiving +2 bonuses to his attack rating in successive battles until the maximum of 16 is reached, at which point he sinks back to his original attack rating of 8. PINT AZN CHOSON Team: Histrionic HP: 75 Attack: 4 Defense: 20 Genius: 12 Charisma: 4 Special Abilities: - Mine Layer: Choson drops some little poo or another, then drags other ships into it. Ships must defend vs. boredom against this attack. Choson frequently manifests Snoop Form during this attack. - Xtremely Defensive: It is very difficult for ships to successfully hit Choson since he never does anything interesting. Despite this, he is horrendously vulnerable to Zseni's Enka Attack. Hyper Mode: Choson gains Blog Mine, an attack in which he unfriends ships from his ship blog. RHETORICAL AUGMENTORS: These ships excel at navigating difficult social and spacial waters, but tend to attach themselves to strong and violent ships, since they themselves are awful at attacking or defending. In exchange they often augment their host's capabilities. LOW-MILEAGE BEAST-GOD GIANT ROBOT AUGMENTOR Mischief Maker Team: Histrionic. Seems to have been created to combat the Mysterio Hive-Mind but may actually have accidentally created it. HP: Varies Attack: Varies Defense: Varies Charisma: Varies Genius: Varies Special Abilities: - Grammar Storm: Constantly playing with word structure and language rules to create nearly unreadable but grammatically correct run-on sentences and made-up word conglomorations. This makes MM immune to Grammar Nazi bolts because you can never tell iof she meant to make that mistake or not. - Transformer: Can transform into any other unit to gain maximum tactical advantage. Has been known to mimic her enemies to stir confusion and dissention in their ranks. -Political Bait 'n Switch: Combo attack with the Creexul archcannon. MM making a comment on IRL politics followed by a troll beam from Creexul will cause all nonvetran units in the vicinity to become caught in Creexul's Null-Dimensional Collision Box. Weaknesses: -Low fuel/Laziness: May abandon an unfinished battle entirely out of boredom. -Treacherous Disciples: Any attempt of MM to raise another ship's experience level will cause that ship to turn hostile. -Little Girl: MM is a known saucy female and, coupled with her lack of attack prowess, can't get anyone to take her seriously. Ships attacking MM get boners. - A+ In Vanity: MM is rendered totally helpless by Mao's Mirror Cloaking. HYPER MODE: MM runs to Zseni for help; pays with sexual favors. Zseni gains Gloat, a temporary shield that soaks the next three critical hits against her. THEORETICAL AUTEUR FLOUNDER Millicent H. Johnson Hayt Williams Team: Sulky HP: 200 Attack: 7 Defense: 7 Genius: ? Charisma:7 Special Attacks: - Unreadable Fiction: His legendarily unreadable fiction works cast a long dark shadow on Hayt's attack positions. Ships must overcome a Fear Aura effect to open attacks on Hayt. - Fatty At The Party: Everyone else's fiction looks so good next to Hayt's, many ships keep him around and protect him just to enjoy the area +2 charisma boost. Hyper Mode: Hayt switches between male and female when panicked.[/quote] Yawn[/quote]