Since there are already cries of EF Bias on the Zeon forums, have some thought process -


(06:59:01 PM) Jon: hi
(06:59:51 PM) Ketara: The basic EFSF plan is they have three groups. Two are mostly balloons with like one real ship, and the third is all real ships. Their idea is to confuse the enemy with the balloons, and use infantry to try to capture the Gwazine, with their MS playing defensively.
(07:00:22 PM) Ketara: The Zeon split their fleet into two groups. The main group inc. the Gwazine attacks head on, while the Tivvay with all the PCs waits to attack the real ships when they figure out which ones are the real ships.
(07:00:42 PM) Ketara: Here are all the stats.
(07:00:54 PM) Ketara: EFSF vs. Zeon Space
Tactical Advantages
Zeon has Detectors, EF does not
Both are Ambushing - Pitched Battle

Fuel considerations
- = 1 fuel point
~ = 2 fuel points
* = 3 fuel points
# = 4 fuel points

Hangar considerations
EF dedicated hangars - 4
Zeon dedicated hangars - 3
(07:01:16 PM) Ketara: EFSF

AURIGA INTERDICTION BATTALION
Vlad the Great - Balloon Salamis
Hardboiled - Balloon Salamis
1x Balloon Public
1x Artillery Support


CANCER FLEET
Advent - 14 VP Salamis
Speed Racer - Balloon Salamis
Titmouse - Balloon Salamis
Grand Hombre - Balloon Columbus
Thirsty Faggot - Balloon Columbus


DAMOCLES STRIKE FORCE
Merrimack - 70/70VP Salamis Kai (Issac Lon'Dozai)
1x 42CP Marines (in missiles)
- Derek Carter - 50VP Guncannon MPT (beam rifle, beam gun, beam spray gun)
- Michael Kreuz - 50VP GM Sniper II (sniper rifle, beam rifle)
- 1x 56VP Saberfish
- 1x 56VP Saberfish
- 1x 28VP Saberfish

Kira Yamato - 42VP Pegasus II
1x 14CP Marines
~ 2x 70VP GM E
~ Otaktai Lone Wolf - 43VP GM Light Armor
~ Issa Kobayashi - 82VP RX-78-1
~ Rachel Arronax - 89VP 1NT GM Juggler (full armor, no bits, beam gun, 90mm)
~ Marc Simmons - 44VP 2NT GM E (2x 90mm machinegun, no shield)
~ 1x 70VP Saberfish
- 1x 56VP Saberfish

Arcadia - 14VP Salamis
- 1x 28VP Saberfish

Softboiled - 14VP Salamis
- 2x 28VP Saberfish

Kicked Puppy - 14VP Columbus
- 5x 14VP Saberfish
- 25x 14CP Marines

Public - 14VP Public

5x 14VP Saberfish (flight support)
(07:01:29 PM) Ketara: ZEON

MAIN GROUP
Monarch - 52/42VP 2NT Gwazine (Wu Jinyuan)
1x Ships Crew - 15CP
Wu Jinyuan - 13CP
- 18x 14VP Zaku II HMT
- 1x 42VP Zaku II E

2x 14VP Jicco

Erinyes Capsule - 56VP Komusai

Pride of Brunswick - 56VP Pazock


AMBUSH GROUP
Lucifers Fury - 47VP Tivvay
* Laredo Veil - 55VP Zaku II E (camera, shield, flash grenades, fuel cells)
~ 2x 47VP Zaku II F
~ 2x 47VP Zaku II HMT
~ 1x 19VP Zaku Minelayer
~ Richard Banks - 60VP Rick Dom
~ Caleb DeGrau - 51VP Prototype Gelgoog
~ Florian Cuyler - 41VP 3NT Schnee Weiss
~ Yoritomo Naizen - 46VP Action Zaku
- Chris Burnett - 46VP 1NT Braw Bro
(07:03:05 PM) Ketara: The EF is heavily outmatched in mobile suits. They have 8 MS and 17 Saberfish. (Softboiled has 1 not 2, typo) Zeon has 30 mobile suits.
(07:03:30 PM) Ketara: However, all the good Zeon PCs are still damaged, making Rachel and Issa a cut above all the Zeon units in terms of VP.
(07:03:45 PM) Ketara: Which will help, but probably not enough.
(07:04:26 PM) Ketara: Also note that Laredo Veil is doing camera support instead of bringing his gun, and Derek Carter is bringing too many guns and should be somehow penalized for it.
(07:04:38 PM) Jon: haha ok
(07:04:57 PM) Ketara: So here are their MORE DETAILED plans.
(07:04:59 PM) Jon: hey, i gotta run to dinner real fast (i'm not going anywhere, just grubbing with fam and grandparents)
(07:05:07 PM) Ketara: s'cool
(07:05:09 PM) Jon: can you leave them on here and i'll read through them when i get back?
(07:05:11 PM) Ketara: yaya
(07:05:13 PM) Jon: and get started?
(07:05:15 PM) Ketara: yaya
(07:05:19 PM) Jon: ok, cool, thanks
(07:12:46 PM) Ketara: Zeons plan -

Monarch will attack the enemy head on, focusing for the fleet that has the Pegasus in it (the one with all the real ships.) Due to Jinyuans natural analytical nature, and them having so many newtypes, and the fact that they are focusing on the Pegasus, the dummies aren't going to fool them and will largely be ignored.

Monarchs MS are split into three groups. Two are six Zaku II HMTs and a Jicco, one is six Zaku II HMTs and the Zaku II E. They will all attack head on, the Jiccos will retreat after doing one bombing run. The Zaku II E will get as close as possible and try to get accurate targeting data on the Pegasus for the Gwazines gunners.

Erinyes Capsule and Pride of Brunswick will stay behind the Gwazine with the Braw Bro, using it as cover. Braw Bro will stay in the rear and only attack with its wire-guided bits. Note that Burnett is only NT1, so he can only actually move one bit at a time.

Lucifers Fury will go below the battlefield and wait till the real fleets position is confirmed. Upon confirmation, it will launch everything. The Schnee Weiss will stay with the ship and only attack with bits. Florian is NT3 so he can control 3 bits at a time, but the Schnee Weiss has 7 bits so he has reserves if some accidentally blow up. The two Zaku II Fs stay in reserve and their orders are to guard Florian.


(07:13:34 PM) Ketara: On top of that, they have three artillery support services, which are supposed to be missile salvos designed to figure out which fleet is real. They will fire early, and one will fire at each of the three EF battlegroups.
(07:21:06 PM) Ketara: EF Plan -

Cancer battlegroup consists of dummies with one real Salamis. Auriga consists of dummies and is supported by one artillery support service. Each will move on one flank, using their real units to try to fake Zeon out, but re: earlier this isn't going to work. Since it will be uncontested by the Gwazine, the one real Salamis in the Cancer group will move for the Tivvay, but it will have to spend some time re-orienting itself since the Tivvay is below the battlefield.

The main EF group, which is 2 Salamis, 1 Columbus, 1 Public, the Pegasus II and the elite Salamis Kai, will move into position but fight defensively. Michael Kreuz and Derek Carter will be in the rear with the ships doing ranged weapon support, while the rest of the MS and the high levelled Saberfish will provide sort of a front defensive line.

Once they get within range, all the EF ships are going to fire a rocket salvo at the Gwazine. Hidden in the salvo are going to be the Merrimack firing hollow armor piercing missiles containing the lvl3 marine team. At the same time, the Public is going to use its two big anti beam missiles to block the first salvo from the Gwazines main guns.
(07:21:54 PM) Ketara: Following that, the Merrimack is going to switch to MIRV missiles. The Columbus will launch all its infantry with jetpacks, and they will attempt to move to the Gwazine undetected. This isn't going to work very well. The 10 low level Saberfish are going to fly cover for the marines.
(07:22:25 PM) Ketara: So here's what IMO will happen.
(07:30:15 PM) Jon: back
(07:30:20 PM) Jon: holy crap, you're still writing it out
(07:30:21 PM) Jon: ahahaha
(07:34:02 PM) Unable to send message: The message is too large.
(07:34:09 PM) Unable to send message: The message is too large.
(07:34:22 PM) Ketara: Early in the battle, through a combination of the Zeon art. services, the newtypes, and Wu Jinyuan being Dr. House, they are going to confirm their initial suspicion that the fleet with the Pegasus is the real fleet, and they'll attack it head on. Once they get into position, the Gwazine will make a 90 degree turn and move at the fleet sideways, since Gwazines are way better at broadsides than frontal bombardments. The EF ships will stay facing forward to make their target signatures smaller, and to maximize their missile ability.

The EF dummy groups and artillery service will fire missiles at the same or similar time to the main group. It should be a pretty huge number of missiles, and hidden in them is the lvl3 marine team. The Publics anti beam missiles will block the Gwazines first shot before it has a chance to maneuver to broadside. The Gwazines AA and the Zakus will cut down a lot of the missiles minimizing the damage, but the Marines will make it aboard.

The real Salamis in the one dummy fleet will move towards the Tivvay, but almost immediately upon leaving the dummy fleet be attacked by bits from the Braw Bro and Dom PTT and be destroyed. Note that when bits attack a ship and it explodes, the explosion destroys the lightly armored bits as well, so Florian and Chris will launch reserve bits at that point.

The Zeon MS will engage the Feddie MS and high leveled Saberfish from both forward and below. The Feddie MS are on the whole better and have more VP, but they're outnumbered three/four to one, so they will only be able to hold for a short time, and will have to move back to the defensive screen of their fleets AA pretty quick.
(07:34:23 PM) Ketara: The marines and the low level Saberfish will move towards the Gwazine, but between accidental hits, the Gwazines big AA compliment, and Zakus shooting at them, the vast majority won't make it to the Gwazine. Probably less than 10% will actually arrive, although that still might be 20 guys.

The Gwazine is only defended by its crew, but it's a pretty big honkin ship, so even though the lvl3 Marines won't face much resistance, there won't be enough of them to take over the entire ship. They'll move to the bridge and hold the bridge crew hostage, but the guns will keep firing.

I want the Gwazines guns to blow up a Federation ship every time they fire. In the initial volley the port and starboard guns will shoot balloons and pop them. The Gwazine can only fire volleys like once every 40 seconds though, and the first volley is blocked by the AB missiles.

The Federation ships primary guns won't be able to do very much, they'll mostly be acting as AA support.

So between the bits, Gwazine, and big MS superiority, the EF fleet will be pretty much decimated. I'd imagine only the Merrimack survives.

However, once the 20 or so guys from the big infantry team make it to the Gwazine, they'll have enough people to start systematically taking control of the ships. Once the ZEF realises that the Gwazine is compromised, they will retreat.
(07:35:14 PM) Ketara: So, moderate to heavy damage to the EF PC's, really severe damage to the EF ships, medium damage to the Zeon PCs, no real damage but some injury to Chris/Florian from psycommu feedback, Wu Jinyuan and the Gwazine captured.
(07:35:43 PM) Ketara: ANY QUESTIONS?
(07:37:05 PM) Jon: do you really want to hurt me?
(07:37:09 PM) Jon: do you really want to make me cry?
(07:37:18 PM) Jon: other than that, not so much
(07:38:07 PM) Ketara: Uhh, long.
(07:38:17 PM) Jon: well, i mean, it's me - that's pretty much a given either way.
(07:38:30 PM) Jon: just curious if you have a specific idea in mind
(07:38:43 PM) Ketara: It's 14 PCs/named NPCs so 7 pages minimum.
(07:38:54 PM) Jon: fff if it's that short i'll be surprised
(07:39:02 PM) Ketara: Sounds good!
(07:39:22 PM) Jon: i'll put together an outline and shoot it to you so you can qc it, if that's okay?
(07:39:27 PM) Ketara: Sure.
(07:39:33 PM) Ketara: I am going to go eat mah own dinnaz
(07:39:40 PM) Jon: k - thanks for the outline, brah
(07:39:45 PM) Jon: enjoy your food, brah
(07:43:25 PM) Ketara: You know, if Chan had just spent 36 RP on four Marine teams to protect his ship from boarders, this would be the biggest Zeon victory in the history of OYW.

Of note, I didn't notice that Latooni was damaged. I also didn't notice that he bought 10 Balls, so kind of evens out.