War Core 2, Chapter 27.

Chapter 27.

The dragonfly-looking transport returned along with a second, similar mech. Once they landed, Hugh’s forces boarded one transport and the civilian mechs boarded the other. Hugh could only hope that back on their homeworld, the real villagers were being taken to somewhere safe. The Kirxnas were stuffed into their transport, but his forces looked pitiful, containing only his avatar, nine infantry mechs, and Lieutenant Cooper’s air mech.

“Sir, any idea where we’re off to next?” Cooper asked.

“Not really, I see a map reference point in the middle of a pretty big city listed as our destination, but I can’t tell you what we’ll find when we get there,” Hugh replied. The troops were quiet on the return flight, likely worried, as Hugh was, about which of their buddies would be deemed a “casualty” and killed in their pods. Hugh distracted himself by going over his current order of battle as well as pulling up the Attached Units ability to see what he’d gained from the upgrade.

Order of Battle:

1. Infantry mechs (141).

2. Light mechs (16).

3. Air mechs (6).

Attached Units:

This ability has been upgraded and now has a small chance to summon either an increased number of standard units or a small group of elite units to join your forces for the duration of a battle. Further upgrades will unlock based on hidden victory conditions in addition to improvements granted as your avatar levels up.

The Attached Units upgrade was nice, but what was going on with the total numbers for his forces? His current troop strength was below what he expected after accounting for the losses he had taken in the battle. He’d have to ask Jiro once they reached the rendezvous. His fellow core had been tasked with escorting the column to their next objective, so it likely meant that they were attacked along the way. If that was the case, Jiro must have done a good job, because his losses weren’t bad considering the losses from the battle that Hugh had just fought in.

Their transport began to slow and Hugh could see a large city when he shifted his view outside. There were more signs of an evacuation underway as a steady trickle of the strange Krixnas ground transports flowed toward the west and away from the steady advance of the Ssath forces. At the western end of the city, Hugh could make out another of the large human factory structures, just like the one that had upgraded their forces earlier. Given the number of mechs milling around outside of it, this must be their destination.

“Hugh, welcome back, how did your fight go?” Jiro asked as the comms once again connected the three cores.

“We won, but it was costly. Thankfully, we were able to save the civilians and kept the Ssath from setting up a sensor relay. The Ssath should now have limited intel in this area, but what actual effect it will have on them, I have no idea. How did your fight go?” Hugh asked.

“It was a bit crazy, Ssath ambush teams hit the column three times during the journey. We were able to keep the losses to a minimum, thanks to the commanders’ help. Each of them was able to operate their mechs, along with a small portion of pod-controlled units, but most of your and Felicia’s forces were operating on an even worse version of the AI control than normal. They just continued marching on the road and taking inaccurate potshots at any Ssath that got close,” Jiro advised.

“Thank you for doing it, I’m sure your efforts helped to keep more of our troops alive. Felicia, how did your team do?” Hugh asked.

“Uh, that’s a no-go, I think Felicia was knocked out in her fight. At one point all her mechs stopped then after a while they continued marching but were no longer able to engage with their weapons. The commander for her troops cut out when Felicia did, which left a gap in our defenses that the Ssath exploited. That’s where most of our casualties came from,” Jiro told him.

“That’s not good, but at least it didn’t happen in the middle of a regular battle. This way, we also will get a chance to see how long it takes for our avatars to get rebuilt,” Hugh said. A system prompt interrupted their conversation.

The avatar for the human war core named Felicia Rose has been defeated, her troops will now be relocated to a safe rally point and will not be available to assist your forces in the next stage of the battle. Upgrades may now be completed but note that the wait for the next battle has been shortened due to the loss of one of your cores.

As soon as the system prompt disappeared, the remaining Royal Marines from Felicia’s army marched onto the transport that Hugh’s forces had just disembarked from. The air mech then launched and flew somewhere off toward the west. None of the mechs from the two squads she had taken with her had returned, and Hugh worried over their casualty rate, which was supposed to be much higher if the avatar was taken out.

“Okay, I guess it’s just us two for now. I was going to upgrade my units while I waited for you to get here, but until now, the factory’s been inactive. Time looks like it’s going to be tight, do you want to go first?” Jiro asked.

“No, you were here first, it looks like I can access the upgrade menu while you’re doing your thing, so I’ll concentrate on planning my upgrades while you get yours started,” Hugh answered.

“Yeah, I was just going to level my forces up and then decide on further upgrades while you run your troops through. Hopefully, we’ll have enough time,” Jiro offered and then began queueing up his troops for the level upgrades.

Hugh’s mechs would hit level four after the level upgrade they received for completing the battle. The question was whether he should upgrade to level five, using up three of his limited points. Level five would unlock more options, including medium mechs. Somehow, the system was supposed to allow him to upgrade some of his light mechs into medium mechs, but he hadn’t seen any details on the process yet.

Without the firepower of the medium mechs, Hugh was worried that he would fall further behind the enemy if he tried to face Ssath medium mechs with only light mechs and infantry. With that in mind, Hugh spent the upgrade points to go to level five on everything and then dug into the options that had been unlocked. There was only one point to spend on upgrades, so he would have to make the most of it.

The level 5 upgrade for your forces has been activated. The medium mech class is unlocked. You may transfer up to half of your existing light mech units and transform them into medium mechs when going through the upgrade process, do you wish to do so? Y/N.

Hugh hit yes and then another prompt appeared asking if he wished to upgrade his avatar as well. He hit yes, figuring the more armor and weapons he had, the better. Getting his avatar taken out would be a disaster with a second core temporarily out of the fight. Once he approved his choice, another slew of upgrade options was presented, many were the same as before, but there were quite a few new ones as well. He filtered out the level upgrades since he already purchased what he could afford from that tree.

Upgrade point options:

1. Avatar upgrades.

2. Infantry mech upgrades.

3. Light mech upgrades.

4. Medium mech upgrades.

5. Heavy mech upgrades. This option is currently locked until medium mechs have been acquired and upgraded to level 7.

6. Air mech upgrades.

7. Attached Units. No further upgrades are currently available.

Avatar Upgrades:

Your avatar has been upgraded to an M4E8 Sherman medium mech.

1. Enhanced armor package. This upgrade will improve the armor on your avatar, attaching reactive panels in key areas to help defeat plasma-based weapons. This upgrade requires 1 upgrade point. This upgrade is mech-specific and doesn’t transfer to other mech designs you may acquire later.

2. Ammunition selection for the main gun. Your main gun can be configured to fire two additional types of ammunition. This upgrade is universal and will function with any new medium or heavy mech designs.

The first type is the fragmentary round. This round will separate into multiple, smaller bits of plasma that cover a large area, making it very useful against multiple, lightly armored enemies. Note that this new ammunition type has a severely reduced effective range.

The second type of ammunition is a fin-stabilized extended range round. Using some of its mass as additional propulsion, this type of round has a 25% greater range than a standard round, but does less damage given that some of its mass has been consumed to propel it to a greater distance.

3. Indirect fire attachment point. This upgrade adds a new weapons hardpoint to your mech, allowing for an indirect fire weapon with a much longer range to be added. This attachment can be researched further at additional cost, enabling the mounting of larger caliber weapons when you upgrade to a larger mech. On your current medium mech chassis, it adds a 60mm automatic mortar that fires explosive plasma rounds. Once installed, additional ammunition types can be unlocked. The range on this weapon is double that of your main gun and can be targeted directly via line of sight, or set to randomly fire over a specific map grid.

Infantry mech upgrades:

1. Plasma grenades launcher. Upgrades your units with a shoulder-mounted grenade launcher, doubling the range of your grenades. In addition, the launcher holds four grenades instead of the three that your units are currently able to carry. Reloads are slowly created over time, further enhancing this weapon system.

2. Targeting enhancement package. This upgrade enhances the accuracy of all infantry mech weapons systems by 5%. The upgrade evolves and improves as the mech levels up.

3. Melee weapons. This upgrade creates a melee weapon appropriate to the combat pod operator’s preference. An initial targeting and combat integration system for melee combat is installed in the mech which will evolve and improve as the mech levels up.

4. Camouflage. This upgrade creates a coating over your infantry mechs, making them 10% more difficult to spot on enemy sensors and reducing the accuracy of all directly targeted attacks. This upgrade improves as the mech levels up.

5. Armor enhancements. Additional armor plates are added to the infantry mech chassis. This upgrade improved durability by 10% but imposes a 5% speed penalty due to the weight. Further upgrades are available, reducing the speed penalty and improving overall protection.

The avatar upgrades were still tempting, but Hugh was leaning toward something else that would upgrade an entire class of mechs instead of just his avatar. Some of the light and medium mech upgrades would also transfer to his avatar, so he dug into those, trying to find something that would offer a sizeable advantage for his forces. Sadly, air mechs were out once again, only seven units made it a tough sell.

Light Mech Upgrades:

Your light mechs will be upgraded to the M3 Stuart. This light mech has improved firepower with a 37mm main gun, improved armor, and a variety of secondary weapons available. Top speed and maneuverability are slightly worse than the T-7 it replaces, but the overall penalty is negligible considering the other improvements over its predecessor.

1. Main gun replacement. This upgrade replaces the 37mm main gun with a magazine-fed rapid-fire unit. The time between shots is drastically reduced until the five-round magazine is expended. Once expended, a longer reload cycle will commence.

2. Shield Generator. This upgrade creates an energy shield that protects the front of the mech. The shield is limited in power and once depleted, it takes some time to recharge. This upgrade is universal across all light mech designs you may unlock during this campaign, and further upgrades may become available as your units level up.

3. Smoke generators. This upgrade allows the mech to generate a dense cloud of smoke around it, hampering enemy sensors and granting concealment for the mech and units around it. This upgrade is universal for all light mech types but is incompatible with medium or heavy mechs.

4. Camouflage package. This package includes a paint scheme and electronic coating that are designed to blend into the natural surroundings. Active only when standing still, the light mechs with this upgrade have a 75% reduction in their scan profile. The firing of any weapon will negate this effect for a short time.

Medium mech upgrades:

Upon reaching level 5, you have unlocked the M4 Sherman medium mech. This mech features a 75mm main gun and comes standard with a 30 caliber, hull-mounted machinegun as a secondary, anti-infantry weapon.

1. Shield generator. This upgrade adds a simple shield generator to your medium mechs, absorbing minor damage until its capacity is reached. Once the generator hits its maximum capacity, the shield will drop until the power has recharged. This upgrade is universal and compatible with all medium and heavy mech models. Further upgrades will be available for the shield generator as the level of your mechs increases.

2. Cannister rounds. A special ammunition type that replaces the normal plasma round with dozens of smaller submunitions that are designed to take out lightly armored targets. Great at clearing out groups of infantry mechs, the canister round is much less effective at damaging heavier armor types.

Heavy mech upgrades:

This option is locked until medium mechs are level 8 or higher.

Air Mech Upgrades:

Your air mechs have reached level 5 and have unlocked an upgrade tree choice. For this campaign, you may only field one type of air mech. You may choose to continue with a fighter and scout design path or increase the size of your mechs to focus on bombing and transport duties.

“Captain Tremaine, we have a couple of options for our air mechs. Do you have a preference on which type I select?” Hugh asked, pushing the information on the decision over to his Air Force commander.

“It depends on the role you wish us to pursue. Since it looks like the number of air mechs is going to be limited, I’d suggest we stick with a fighter focus. I’d rather have the option to engage air targets and going with bombers would make my mechs easy prey for enemy fighters. If we had more than a handful of mechs, I’d want a mix, but for now, with the restrictions forced on us, I’d go with focusing on the fighters,” Tremaine replied. Hugh took his advice and selected the fighter path, which unlocked path-specific options for his air mechs.

Your air mechs will be upgraded to the F4F Wildcat fighter mech. This mech features not only better speed and maneuverability than your previous air mech but also has heavier armor for greater survivability. Firepower is provided by a pair of wing-mounted, 50 caliber main guns with several upgrade options.

1. Additional firepower. Upgrade your air mechs to include a pair of 30 caliber guns mounted next to the current 50 caliber weapons. These weapons are dual-purpose and can strike both air and ground targets.

2. Ground mode enhancement. This upgrade allows your air mechs to transform from air into ground modes much more quickly. While in ground mode, their maneuverability is improved, and weapons accuracy is on par with other ground-based mechs. This upgrade is universal across all air mech types and improves with the level of the mech.

3. Targeting enhancement package. This set of upgrades improves the accuracy of the weapons on your air mechs. Accuracy and range against air targets are improved by 10% and against ground targets, your weapons will have a 5% improvement.

Hugh had several good upgrade options. Further upgrading his infantry with grenade launchers would be strong, but he wanted to look at something that would help both his avatar and the medium mechs he was now able to field. Out of the available medium mech options, the shield generator upgrade had the biggest upside. While it sounded like it would be of limited effectiveness initially, the fact that it was upgradeable and compatible with both medium and heavy mechs made it a good choice. Selecting the shield upgrade, Hugh made his way around the perimeter that his forces had set up while Jiro’s mechs received their upgrades. Hopefully, the GCA would give him enough time to complete all the upgrades before they dropped the next mission on them.