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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Lazybones" data-source="post: 5287807" data-attributes="member: 143">Yeah, he actually did that in-game. I think that the muton's fortitude was too high for the stun rod to have an effect unless he rolled a 1 on his save, so they improvised. <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" />* * * * * Interlude: Aftermath (October 28-- , 2008)* * * Note: there were a lot of great player posts on the research and manufacturing priorities this week. They are all in the original thread over at Neverwinter Connections, but for the sake of keeping the story posting manageable I just selected these two, from Smart_Alec and Jenniza. They focus on the progress on the Experimental Heavy Armor project.* * * "When you're ready, Mr. Kasprjak." It was a strange feeling, but as time went on, an amazing one, too.  The weight was negligible, as he'd come to expect from the powered suits, but there was more to this.  The exoskeleton was stiff and unresponsive to start with, making Vasily feel as if he was walking underwater, but Grace and her chirpy techs explained that as the suit's computer gradually adjusted to his movements, it would improve. And, hour by hour, it did.  As he stomped around the lab, flexing his arms, twisting from side to side, bending back and forth - and as Jane and the technicians gradually fitted and welded new plates to what slowly became a suit of armor, there came a feeling not just of freedom, but of power.  By the time the legs were complete, he was leaping three feet off the floor; as the welding efforts reached his chest, he was lifting fifty kilograms with each arm, over and over, as easily as if the dumbbells were bags of groceries.  There was no weight, no strain - almost an out-of-body experience, if not for the fact that it was under his control.  The physical strength of the Muton Commander had been immense, and he'd looked back and realized he'd been lucky to hold his own for as long as he had as it had beaten him bloody.  He'd been saved from death at the inhuman slab of muscle's hands only by Mary's mind powers and Hadrian's pinpoint shooting.  Next time, if there was a next time, things would not be so uneven. By the time the helmet was being fashioned and the suit was decoupled from the external power source, he was pulling handstands up against the wall, to the surprise of those who'd dropped by to watch.  It was the first time in a long time, he realized, lifted off the floor by power-assisted limbs, that he'd seen everyone in a room smile: the technicians, the spectators, and of course, himself. *** The high hadn't quite worn off as he marched to the barracks shower block, determined not to attend the day's psi-training session covered in sweat, when he almost walked into a familiar face at the rec room door; Agents Drake, Johnson and Johnson loomed in the doorway, intent on the lift.  Both sides stopped and took stock of who they faced, wearing mutual cool stares and disapproving sneers. He stepped back to let them pass, but she merely took a few steps through before turning to face him, folding her arms, letting the Johnsons pass on behind her, waiting for an apology, or possibly just trying to think of an appropriate remark.  He broke the silence first. "Cataleena say I can't hit you." Drake raised an unimpressed eyebrow.  "And she'd be right, Crackerja- hey! Y- mmf!" So he kissed her instead. It took her by surprise, that was for sure.  She'd not expected him to do anything, or simply hadn't expected a grab-and-hold like this one.  He didn't know what inspired it - an unusually whimsical mood, perhaps - but the outraged, off-balance expression on her face for those few moments afterwards was truly hilarious, with the backhand she lay across his jaw before stalking off forming the literal punchline.  Judging from the looks the Chief and the lift guards were giving him, they were probably inclined to agree, and though Drake's two shadows were unreadable as ever, they left without remark, which was an answer in itself, in a way. Allowing himself a self-satisfied moment of triumph, Vasily walked through the open door, Vasily strolled into the rec room. *** It was, therefore, a relaxed and upbeat Vasily Kasprjak who came to the psi-lab that day, wandering over to the chair with a spring in his step and accepting the headgear without his usual grimace. "Okay," he asserted. "Hit me with your best shot." Frankly, at that moment, he felt like he could tear Mars down from the sky by himself.* * * Once Vasily left after the initial series of tests, Jane huddled the team around some schematics she'd been working on. One of the engineers looked at them, "Are you sure about this?" Jane grinned, "I've had worse hair-brained ideas." Another looked at Jane, "Yeah, but are you sure he'd go for this?" A bunch of engineers began to debate. "He'd have to be nuts to try this" "I don't know, think about the possibilities." "But think about the risks." "What if he pukes?" "That man has the constitution of a bull elephant." "Can he control the systems?" "With training, I suppose." "But can we even build it?" "We won't know until we try." Grace wrapped it up, "Then we proceed with the plans to add flight systems to the Experimental Heavy Armor."* * * After the frenetic buildup to the base attack mission, the aftermath came as a bit of an anticlimax. The interrogation of the Muton Commander went well enough, although Cat's attempts to analyze the alien's language led to some dead-ends for the research team.  Overall the research was frustrating and intense, although by the end of the week, the biological sciences team was sending coordinates to the physical sciences team.  Work began on planning for the Mars mission. (Cat: roll of 3 on Linguistics skill, no benefit) Work was also started on the second-generation of the regen serum.  Early results met expectations, but there wais a setback as Mary accidentally deletes a whole directory of important files on one of the research workstations.  The work continued, and the problem was eventually overcome as the techs were able to recover a partial backup off the mainframe, but the project ended up well behind schedule after the first week of work. (Mary: roll of 1 on Biology skill, -2 researcher/weeks on project) The Experimental Heavy Armor project, on the other hand, went better than expected.  Jane was able to solve a tricky problem with the joint actuators, which helped to free up some engineers to help work on producing more medikits.  The "flying" upgrade was more doubtful, although an emergency thrust-augmented hydraulic boost system is installed that would allow Vasily to make prodigious leaps—if he didn’t lose control and slam into a rock face at 100kph. (While there was flying armor in the original X-COM, it didn’t really fit that well into the NWN engine.) Two units of Regen Serum and seven extra medikits were produced, and both lines were primed for full output before the Mars mission is launched. The regen project was prepared with the new information from the Serum 2 research, so that future manufacturing of the serum lines could produce the upgraded product, if that research was completed on time. (Jane: roll of 13 on Craft Mechanical, +17, for a Complete Success result) (James: roll of 14 on Craft Pharma, +14, for a Major Success result) After the impressive results from the previous week's training, the following week in the Psi Lab resulted more in frustration than celebration. However, Doctor Allen continued his streak of remarkable progress on the psi training assessments. Will save vs. DC15 (+1 per point >14 on roll) +1 to roll for IC posting. Jane: roll (1 + 11 + 1) +0 bonus Cat: roll (3 + 6 + 1) = +0 bonus Vasily: roll (7 + 5) = +0 bonus Mary: roll (3 + 12 +1) = +2 bonus James: roll (15 + 12 +1) = +14 bonus Hadrian: roll (13 + 9 - 1) = +7 bonus</blockquote>

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