Mission: INSURGENT AIRFIELD
Answering the call: Cav, Richard, Dan, Christian, Greg and Craig.
I sprinted down the hill toward the airfield. Taking the aircraft went like clockwork: both outside Ivans went down before I reached the runway, and I quickly disposed of both in the hangars.
Richard and Dan powered up the su25s, while I lifted the Hip8 and flew it back to hover above the rocks. The convoy arrived and massed between the control tower and the hangars. We all held fire, sticking to the plan, while our bombers streaked in.
BOOM! Fire blanketed the area. I saw one UAZ car launched higher than my helicopter, hurtling over paddocks to the NW of the airfield. Those of us on the hill spotted, directing the bombers' fire, while they roared in for pass after pass. Sometimes they carpeted Ivan with dumb-fire bombs, sometimes they surgically took out vehicles with missile strikes. One time they did both at once in a synchronised crossover that looked awesome, and I saw Dan hose the ground in a strafing run.
Meanwhile Craig "Capt Grumpy" came in with a freshly pressed uniform, and had exactly as much luck as the rest of us did the first time. He reported a green circle on his screen that I assumed was the command view reticle but later turned out to be his night vision goggles!
Above us Dan's weapons ran dry. He ejected right over us, the su25 spiralling down onto the runway while he drifted onto the hill via parachute.
We tried to get everyone into the chopper but couldn't get Craig in. In the end I was forced to leave him on the hill with the AI and flew the others back to the LZ where we exchanged various weapons for sniper rifles. When I lifted off Richard reported that he also was out of ordinance.
Destroying all aircraft triggered a large force in Krasnostav, so I wanted some insurance in case Ivan shot the chopper down. I asked Rich to land the su25 now that the airfield was (mostly) ours. He brought it down and then rolled off the runway into some trees. I eased down the Hip and picked him up, and flew us back to the radio tower:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/splat_squadron/photos/album/1319944/pic/842357350/view?picmode=large&mode=tn&order=ordinal&start=1&dir=asc
On the way we saw a couple of Ivans running full tilt down the hill and across the runway. Greg got both on the run with precise bursts, I'm sure one was even a single-shot kill!
Meanwhile Dan had been helping out Craig. He could now change weapon modes, but had a more serious problem: severe lag.
We all assembled at the top of the hill for a photo:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/splat_squadron/photos/album/1319944/pic/1845020228/view?picmode=large&mode=tn&order=ordinal&start=1&dir=asc
Craig, on the left of the photo, reached the top of the hill but couldn't see anyone(and to him, the chopper was frozen sideways in midair!).
A couple of us went over to talk to him. He could hear our voices but couldn't see us:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/splat_squadron/photos/album/1319944/pic/1475812737/view?picmode=large&mode=tn&order=ordinal&start=1&dir=asc
At that point I saved the game.
Time to deploy sniper teams. Craig exited to see if coming in again would fix the lag. While his marine was controlled by the AI, Richard ordered it into the chopper. I flew us to a point Christian had selected (WNW of the airfield) and they set about picking off a force of 10-15 insurgents. While Craig had an assault rifle, Ivan was out of his effective range.
I took off with Greg and Dan as door gunners, floating us over their group and around the hangars. Between the snipers picking them off from the hill and PKM fire pouring from above, the force had no chance against SPLAT!
After they'd been eradicated, I lifted us up for a recon and flew over the town. No threats were visible. Rich reminded us of another pickup that had been spotted south of the airfield, so I flew us over for a look.
It was parked with its nose against a telephone pole, not moving or firing. I thought it was empty, but when I attempted to land in front of it the 50 cal opened up on us! I bugged out of there, and our snipers began moving down from the airfield to take out the gunner.
Just then a large force was spotted to the north of the chopper, moving through the trees.
I puzzled over why the pickup had taken so long to fire, then remembered that once in the armory I'd used an insurgent pickup that didn't have a turret or tripod, just an MG mounted on the roof. It only fired forward. Just maybe...
I brought the chopper down in a tricky landing behind the pickup, between the telephone wires and some trees. Dan sprang from the helicopter. If I was wrong he would have been in extreme danger, but he swiftly dispatched the gunner and driver with two shots and climbed in. We had another armed vehicle!
Our snipers ran straight into Ivan's reinforcements. Craig was the first to take a bullet, Richard soon after as he attempted to revive him. The AI dropped like flies, followed by Christian, as Dan roared in with the pickup. He climbed up to the MG and hammered defiantly at Ivan as Greg and I swept in to help.
Greg blasted away. One Ivan ran at us along a road, so I dropped in front of him at only a couple of metres. Greg sprayed bullets everywhere but somehow this guy danced right through them all at point blank range. I swung the chopper round and almost smashed into a tree trying to not let him go, but he disappeared among some buildings. We flew over them to see where he went, and as Greg fired again his gun emptied with a click.
(Note: pretty sure both guns use a common pool of bullets, Need to confirm).
We had to try and rescue our squadmates in time. I slid us into a paddock near the ominously empty pickup, and we jumped out with our rifles. I shot about four insurgents, then tried to move forward and revive someone when I was killed. Didn't even see who did it.
At that point the game CRASHED. Right out to the desktop! A fittingly cataclysmic end to SPLAT's defeat.
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