His Majesty's Dragons: World at War

[JimmyTheCannon]

Bah... why is it Jeb and Faust did almost exactly the same thing, but Faust gets hurt and Jeb is fine?

In any case, I should've described what I was picturing in my head better. Too late now.

[Dark Silver]

For one, they were attacking two different dragons, in which the reactions of those dragons would be different, maybe one is a bit more skittish, or the one you attacked was a longer vet than the one Jeb attacked.

Or the gods hate you.

Take your pick.

[JimmyTheCannon]

I'm going with "the gods hate me."

[Cynical Cat]

Bah... why is it Jeb and Faust did almost exactly the same thing, but Faust gets hurt and Jeb is fine?

Because that's not true. You got close enough to swing your tail while Tev got close enough to trade bullets while feinting a close quarters attack, which isn't the same thing. Second, you're in a combat lightweight which would pulp Jeb straight on and Jeb's very fast and maneuverable even by lightweight standards. He didn't get as close and is better at breaking away. Different dragons, different tactics.

[JimmyTheCannon]

Because that's not true. You got close enough to swing your tail while Tev got close enough to trade bullets while feinting a close quarters attack, which isn't the same thing. Second, you're in a combat lightweight which would pulp Jeb straight on and Jeb's very fast and maneuverable even by lightweight standards. He didn't get as close and is better at breaking away. Different dragons, different tactics.

Point.

[rhoenix]

This is a thing that CynCat just pointed out. Just because two dragons are the same size and same weight class does not at all mean they use similar tactics. Jeb and Faust are good examples - Haakon and Franklin are another good example.

Jeb is lighter, and frighteningly maneuverable, especially with his wingclaws - it's one of the hallmarks of his breed. Faust is heavier, a little tougher, has a big bone club - but not quite as sinuously maneuverable in the air.

Haakon is about 1.5 tons lighter, is faster than Franklin in terms of top speed, and slightly more maneuverable, though not quite as resilient. Franklin is tougher, far more stable in terms of flight, he's pretty maneuverable for his size, but his top speed isn't very impressive.

In short, look over your dragon's breed page for ideas on a particular breed's favored tactics. And, if you'd like to discuss them, many people would be willing to - giving more flavor and getting to know the breeds better is never a bad thing, especially when one must use them tactically.

Especially against a GM who scorns using dice to screw people - he prefers the "cause and effect" approach. ;)

[JimmyTheCannon]

I did read it... the Bonetail is supposed to be very fast and agile as well. With that said, though, if anybody has tactical suggestions, I'd love to hear them.

[rhoenix]

I did read it... the Bonetail is supposed to be very fast and agile as well. With that said, though, if anybody has tactical suggestions, I'd love to hear them.

Well, here's an idea off the top of my head. Herd enemies by shooting at them, strafing them, setting them up for attacks from others, and generally pissing them off and destroying their unit cohesion. If one of them gets mad enough to want to get close, use their angle of approach to introduce them to The Club.

Specifically in terms of lightweights, although Faust is pretty good in melee combat due to his tail, there are many others who are good in melee combat as well, for different reasons. Look for ways to use their strengths against them, and then exploit their weaknesses.

[Cynical Cat]

I did read it... the Bonetail is supposed to be very fast and agile as well. With that said, though, if anybody has tactical suggestions, I'd love to hear them.

It is, but so are the Italian lightweights. You decided to get stuck in ahead of the rest of the squadron when we're outnumbered and you're paying for the mistake. The enemy has four mediums and two lightweights and every single one can tear the shit out of you. You're on a lightweight. You can't do this head on shit. Wrong type of dragon period, even when the numbers favor you. Frostfell can do it and in another situation he very well might, but you can't. Make some distance and wait for someone to get vulnerable. Engaged with another dragon, a bad turn that allows a flank, drops to low, whatever. Then hit them.

[Dark Silver]

You could also hope that peel of thunder that's occurring in the middle of the fight zone right now from Thundercracker's breath weapon will cause a few of those Italians to get confused for a few seconds, and try clubbing them then.

[Comrade Tortoise]

Bah... why is it Jeb and Faust did almost exactly the same thing, but Faust gets hurt and Jeb is fine?

Here is the deal. Jeb is an outright aerobat breed. He is fast, he is maneuverable. Very maneuverable. As in, "contortionist" sort of maneuverable. A bonetail is not. Speed is good, but nothing spectacular. Maneuverability is on the upper end, but not aerobatic. Razorbacks ARE aerobats. To conceptualize this, think about the difference between the flight of a swallow vs a kestral. You are the swallow. Now imagine you are a large weasel trying to kill a porcupine. But not just any porcupine. A porcupine that knows capoeira. You have to do completely different things to take it down. Waiting until it is distracted and then going for the soft underbelly is one way. What you did was go straight in and telegraph your punch. Bad move.

Contrast that with what Haakon did (granted, we will see how that goes) in order to basically do what you tried (his tail spikes are artificial, but still). He feigned an attack on another dragon, in order to hit a second without them seeing the attack coming. The nimbus is fairly fast, faster than Haakon. However, wings that permit long-range and speed do not permit maneuverability (think about an albatross or pelican). They have to commit to flying in one direction, which they have. Haakon is more analogous to a gosshawk. Not as fast in straightaway but more maneuverable. He does not have to commit to that one direction, but he has limits on how tight his turns are and has to deal with a certain amount of momentum. He can turn that momentum into an attack however, without having to grapple with something that can rip him apart.

[JimmyTheCannon]

Understood. I've never claimed to be a brilliant tactician - honestly, the only thing I could think of when faced with the Razorbacks was "take it out before it can use its blades", which is probably the exact reaction they're designed to invoke. I'll take this as a learning experience, assuming we survive.

[rhoenix]

We've all gone through it. Havoc tosses everyone into the deep end of the pool to start with.

[JimmyTheCannon]

Time to swim, then.

[General Havoc]

Your attack and Jeb's had different results for a variety of reasons.

For one thing, you led off the assault, which with a Lightweight is always a dangerous proposition. Larger than Jeb, and with a far more visible weapon (your tail-club is obvious to anyone with eyes while Jeb's claws still haven't been spotted) you naturally focused the attention of the Razorbacks squarely on you. Moreover, given the obvious nature of what that club is for, and the overhead dive you attempted on the Razorback, it had plenty of time to consider what to do in reply, and how precisely to do it. You are a very maneuverable dragon, but you were in the middle of a scream dive while trying to smash a precise target with the tip of your tail, a position not at all conducive to high-speed maneuvering. Moreover, the Razorback didn't give you much in the way of time to react. And as others have pointed out, despite being larger than you, Razorbacks are also high-performance maneuverability dragons, and more than capable of keeping up with you.

Jeb was in a different position. For one thing, as a Courierweight, and without a massive weight on his tail, he is going to attract less attention than you are and be better able to maneuver in a dive once he attracts it. Secondly, the dragon he targeted did see him coming, but did not see what he was attempting to do until quite late in the game. Jeb's claws are fairly subtle, and the breed is largely unknown outside America. The Razorback saw Jeb apparently attmepting to smash his wing into the Razorback's head, which made no sense to him, as Jeb was visibly not wearing wingblades (which are steel blades strapped to the leading edge of a lightweight's wing). As such, having only focused on Jeb later, and being unable to determine what Jeb's plan was, the Razorback elected to disengage rather than attempt some kind of fancy reciprocal counterstrike. You will note that Jeb's attack, delivered as it was out of the blue sky to a dragon who was watching him, missed just as yours did. Jeb's target simply didn't elect to counterattack without a better sense of what he was dealing with.

There are a couple lessons here. First off, you are a combat lightweight, and a fairly unsubtle one at that, but you cannot expect to deliver an overhead dive attack (which limits your own maneuverability) against a highly maneuverable target that can see you coming miles away, and land it. What is likely to happen is that the enemy will, given all the time he has available to plan, find some way of doing something evil to you as was just done. That mace of yours is a terrible weapon when deployed against lightweights, but because of that, any lightweight with sense will do everything he can to avoid being struck by it. Just as you would likely refrain from trying to body slam a dragon covered with spikes.

Secondly, when you lead the attack, you get most of the attention. This can be a good or bad thing. Had there been clouds or something to hide the rest of the squadron, you might have even drawn more fire your way (and that might actually be a good thing), as the rest of the Italian formation would be unable to see your support. As it stands though, with you attacking while visibly screening midweight dragons coming up from behind (to say nothing of Frostfell), the larger Italians saw that you were just a skirmisher, and elected to leave you to the (highly lethal) lightweights they had for skirmish duties.

A Razorback is a very nasty lightweight dragon, more dangerous than either of the German lightweights (albeit hamstrung by the congenital insanity of the Italian Air Force). They are larger, stronger, and better armed than you, and just as fast and maneuverable. Taking one out is a very difficult proposition for any lightweight (and even most larger dragons). But that aside, it is generally very hard to bring any dragon down. Dragons are durable bastards, and can take a lot of punishment to meaningfully injure. Do not expect to simply fly up there and acquire kills. Even Frostfell, who is eight or ten times your size and a mean sonofabitch to boot, only acquired two kills and one "likely" kill in all the bloody battles we engaged in the previous thread. One of those was a lightweight who made a suicide run against him, and none of them were heavyweights in his own class or larger, despite much fighting and Cyncat's best efforts. Other players, some of whom made mistakes and some of whom did not, had equally small scores if you're thinking "kills". What matters isn't how many dragons you actually kill, but whether the mission is complete, how much damage you inflict, and what feats of general badassery you can pull off.

You'll get the hang of it. Or maybe you'll die horribly. Either way, more fun for me :)

[JimmyTheCannon]

Oh, I wasn't truly expecting to actually kill it. Just couldn't think of anything else to try at the moment. Rest assured future attacks will be more considered. :-)

[General Havoc]

Cyncat, I know we discussed getting Frostfell a six-pounder for his top turret, but it was not my intention to permit you to start with one. No dragons, not even the largest heavyweights, pack weapons of that size as standard issue, and the job of installing one on a dragon turret is a custom one that would require quite a bit of engineering. I know that you spent a good amount of intervening time in Essex, but for game balance reasons I've turned down other people's requests to begin with those sorts of special goods (with one exception, and that one useless until you find a thunderstorm). Once you're in a position to get the work done on your combat harness (which is a custom job by itself, Wendigo being as rare as they are), you can mount a six-pounder or any other reasonable thing you like, but for now, you'll have to make do with your original 4x20mm ADA mount.

[Cynical Cat]

Cyncat, I know we discussed getting Frostfell a six-pounder for his top turret, but it was not my intention to permit you to start with one. No dragons, not even the largest heavyweights, pack weapons of that size as standard issue, and the job of installing one on a dragon turret is a custom one that would require quite a bit of engineering. I know that you spent a good amount of intervening time in Essex, but for game balance reasons I've turned down other people's requests to begin with those sorts of special goods (with one exception, and that one useless until you find a thunderstorm). Once you're in a position to get the work done on your combat harness (which is a custom job by itself, Wendigo being as rare as they are), you can mount a six-pounder or any other reasonable thing you like, but for now, you'll have to make do with your original 4x20mm ADA mount.

As you wish. You were talking about 75mm on heavyweights so I thought going to a 6 pounder, especially given the weight of the other dragons in the squadron, was reasonable.

[Hawkwings]

Oh yeah, I'm here. And entering combat. Sorry for the delay.

[General Havoc]

As you wish. You were talking about 75mm on heavyweights so I thought going to a 6 pounder, especially given the weight of the other dragons in the squadron, was reasonable.

Oh it's reasonable to put a six-pounder on Frostfell (though it will take him some time to figure out how to use it effectively), it's just a matter of starting equipment. I have to have something to reward you with after you singlehandedly annihilate Luftflotte 4, don't I?

Besides, while most heavyweights can carry a 75mm, it's exceedingly rare to encounter one that actually does so. Precision artillery fire from dragonback is ludicrously difficult to pull off. Frostfell will need to spend time practicing if he wants to hit anything with his six-pounder once he gets it.

[Cynical Cat]

[ have something to reward you with after you singlehandedly annihilate Luftflotte 4, don't I?

Besides, while most heavyweights can carry a 75mm, it's exceedingly rare to encounter one that actually does so. Precision artillery fire from dragonback is ludicrously difficult to pull off. Frostfell will need to spend time practicing if he wants to hit anything with his six-pounder once he gets it.

Well its a good thing that Frostfell won't be doing the shooting.

[frigidmagi]

So Havoc in this universe will

[youtube][/youtube]

This video have dragon singers?

[Comrade Tortoise]

FrigidMagi is bad. FrigidMagi deserves to be punished.

[Dark Silver]

Other players, some of whom made mistakes and some of whom did not, had equally small scores if you're thinking "kills". What matters isn't how many dragons you actually kill, but whether the mission is complete, how much damage you inflict, and what feats of general badassery you can pull off.

I recall one German Lightweight who got turned into a juicy slush in mid air right next to Jeb and Judith......for instance...

[JimmyTheCannon]

FrigidMagi is bad. FrigidMagi deserves to be punished.

Agreed.