Athena: Fall of Europe (OOC | Closed-ish)

[Senkaku]

Are all the characters going to be starting together somehow? If not, how are they supposed to meet up? I ask because so far we have people who were at the NATO/UN command, people who were at ATHENA HQ, and people who were just soldiers on the Line, and it doesn't seem clear how they'll all get together.

[Camicon]

All those locations are relatively close to each other. It's not like they're spread out across the continental United States. This is mainland Europe, and we're talking about a defensive line on Germany's border, with ATHENA HQ on the Netherland's coast. That's a three hour drive, at the absolute maximum. About six if you start from Berlin.

[Senkaku]

All those locations are relatively close to each other. It's not like they're spread out across the continental United States. This is mainland Europe, and we're talking about a defensive line on Germany's border, with ATHENA HQ on the Netherland's coast. That's a three hour drive, at the absolute maximum. About six if you start from Berlin.

I know, but presumably there are other human beings in that area (if there aren't, contact may be even more difficult due to, you know, alien death machines and such). I'm just saying it's unclear how these people will be introduced to one another, given their scattered-ness, even over a relatively small area. And since their access to most vehicles is probably now at least somewhat restricted by alien layz0rz, that complicates things further.

[Acroticus]

Tag for interest!

[Camicon]

All those locations are relatively close to each other. It's not like they're spread out across the continental United States. This is mainland Europe, and we're talking about a defensive line on Germany's border, with ATHENA HQ on the Netherland's coast. That's a three hour drive, at the absolute maximum. About six if you start from Berlin.

I know, but presumably there are other human beings in that area (if there aren't, contact may be even more difficult due to, you know, alien death machines and such). I'm just saying it's unclear how these people will be introduced to one another, given their scattered-ness, even over a relatively small area. And since their access to most vehicles is probably now at least somewhat restricted by alien layz0rz, that complicates things further.

Just because the aliens broke through doesn't mean that they have control over the area. I should think there are enough military assets in the area to establish general evac routes for everyone to retreat along.

[Anowa]

[Vancon]

(Image)

Shhhhh

[Camicon]

(Image)

Shhhhh

Well, in XCOM, the aliens didn't pussy-foot around for five years. They walked right in, smacked down anyone that thought of standing up to them, and set up shop.

[Anowa]

Shhhhh

Well, in XCOM, the aliens didn't pussy-foot around for five years. They walked right in, smacked down anyone that thought of standing up to them, and set up shop.

I'm still salty of the instant waffle-stomp that XCOM got given.

[Bentus]

Are all the characters going to be starting together somehow? If not, how are they supposed to meet up? I ask because so far we have people who were at the NATO/UN command, people who were at ATHENA HQ, and people who were just soldiers on the Line, and it doesn't seem clear how they'll all get together.

The characters will all meet up/have met up at the start of the RP. There's a ton of reasons why doing so would be difficult and unlikely, especially given many of their shared pasts, but suspension of disbelief has its moments and it's far from impossible. Maybe say that the line was falling back, with at least some degree of cohesiveness, until NATO was pressed into the Netherlands. With Athena HQ down, the rest of command and morale plummeted with it and all hell really broke loose.

(Image)

Dayum. I like it.

[Camicon]

Well, in XCOM, the aliens didn't pussy-foot around for five years. They walked right in, smacked down anyone that thought of standing up to them, and set up shop.

I'm still salty of the instant waffle-stomp that XCOM got given.

Steam keeps global statistics for game achievements, which gives up some things to consider.

Of all the people that have played XCOM, only 26.9% have completed it, at any difficulty.
4.8% have beaten it on Classic.
1.2% have beaten it on Impossible.
1.7% of players have completed an Ironman run on Classic or Impossible.
So, let's be extremely generous, and say that a quarter of that 1.7% Ironman completion runs were on Impossible (I guarantee they were almost entirely on Classic). So of everyone who owns the game, a maximum of 0.425% have completed it on Impossible Ironman.

Further, Steam has no way to keeping track of who cheated their way to that achievement (let's assume none did), but more importantly, no way to track how many attempts were made before someone successfully completed the game. That means all those above stats are only accurate if we assume that everyone completed their respective games on their first attempt. In reality, the success rate for completing the game on any difficulty will be lower than 26.9%, lower still for completion on Classic, and once again lower still on Impossible. You see where I'm going with this, no doubt; that assumed completion rate of 0.425% on Impossible Ironman is probably much, much, much smaller. Zemalf is probably best known for this feat, beating the game in 50 hours over 58 videos, without any deaths (though he admits that his victory was as much luck as skill in the early goings).

I think it would be appropriate to place XCOM's odds of fending off the alien invasion to be somewhere in the range of 0.4% to 0.004%, though it could very well be (and probably is) much lower.

How's that for salty?

[Anowa]

I'm still salty of the instant waffle-stomp that XCOM got given.

Steam keeps global statistics for game achievements, which gives up some things to consider.

Of all the people that have played XCOM, only 26.9% have completed it, at any difficulty.
4.8% have beaten it on Classic.
1.2% have beaten it on Impossible.
1.7% of players have completed an Ironman run on Classic or Impossible.
So, let's be extremely generous, and say that a quarter of that 1.7% Ironman completion runs were on Impossible (I guarantee they were almost entirely on Classic). So of everyone who owns the game, a maximum of 0.425% have completed it on Impossible Ironman.

Further, Steam has no way to keeping track of who cheated their way to that achievement (let's assume none did), but more importantly, no way to track how many attempts were made before someone successfully completed the game. That means all those above stats are only accurate if we assume that everyone completed their respective games on their first attempt. In reality, the success rate for completing the game on any difficulty will be lower than 26.9%, lower still for completion on Classic, and once again lower still on Impossible. You see where I'm going with this, no doubt; that assumed completion rate of 0.425% on Impossible Ironman is probably much, much, much smaller. Zemalf is probably best known for this feat, beating the game in 50 hours over 58 videos, without any deaths (though he admits that his victory was as much luck as skill in the early goings).

I think it would be appropriate to place XCOM's odds of fending off the alien invasion to be somewhere in the range of 0.4% to 0.004%, though it could very well be (and probably is) much lower.

How's that for salty?

I'm fine with XCOM getting waffle-stomped, just not instantly waffle-stomped.

[Camicon]

Steam keeps global statistics for game achievements, which gives up some things to consider.

Of all the people that have played XCOM, only 26.9% have completed it, at any difficulty.
4.8% have beaten it on Classic.
1.2% have beaten it on Impossible.
1.7% of players have completed an Ironman run on Classic or Impossible.
So, let's be extremely generous, and say that a quarter of that 1.7% Ironman completion runs were on Impossible (I guarantee they were almost entirely on Classic). So of everyone who owns the game, a maximum of 0.425% have completed it on Impossible Ironman.

Further, Steam has no way to keeping track of who cheated their way to that achievement (let's assume none did), but more importantly, no way to track how many attempts were made before someone successfully completed the game. That means all those above stats are only accurate if we assume that everyone completed their respective games on their first attempt. In reality, the success rate for completing the game on any difficulty will be lower than 26.9%, lower still for completion on Classic, and once again lower still on Impossible. You see where I'm going with this, no doubt; that assumed completion rate of 0.425% on Impossible Ironman is probably much, much, much smaller. Zemalf is probably best known for this feat, beating the game in 50 hours over 58 videos, without any deaths (though he admits that his victory was as much luck as skill in the early goings).

I think it would be appropriate to place XCOM's odds of fending off the alien invasion to be somewhere in the range of 0.4% to 0.004%, though it could very well be (and probably is) much lower.

How's that for salty?

I'm fine with XCOM getting waffle-stomped, just not instantly waffle-stomped.

Why wouldn't they be instantly waffle-stomped? Their enemy is coming from outer space, which means they can either bend space-time and punch holes through it or travel faster than light, and that's only if they're from the same universe. It would be like if the US military walked into Ancient Greece with the intention of crushing all opposition before them; the city-states wouldn't stand a chance.

[Anowa]

I'm fine with XCOM getting waffle-stomped, just not instantly waffle-stomped.

Why wouldn't they be instantly waffle-stomped? Their enemy is coming from outer space, which means they can either bend space-time and punch holes through it or travel faster than light, and that's only if they're from the same universe. It would be like if the US military walked into Ancient Greece with the intention of crushing all opposition before them; the city-states wouldn't stand a chance.

Instantly though?

[Camicon]

Why wouldn't they be instantly waffle-stomped? Their enemy is coming from outer space, which means they can either bend space-time and punch holes through it or travel faster than light, and that's only if they're from the same universe. It would be like if the US military walked into Ancient Greece with the intention of crushing all opposition before them; the city-states wouldn't stand a chance.

Instantly though?

Pretty much. Like, sure, maybe those Ancient Greeks would be able to catch a few US infantry with some arrows, and maybe XCOM would shoot up a few Sectoids, but it would be a rout of epic proportions. The aggressors are packing weapons, armour, and technologies, that the defenders have never even seen before; a full-on invasion would prevent them from having any time to adapt to a plethora of fundamentally game-changing things.

[Sonitusia]

Reviewing the current situation, this'll be interesting for Odetta, considering this is her turf (Germany). A hunter fighting in a land she knows can be a bit dangerous.

[The Armed Republic of Dutch Coolness]

Reviewing the current situation, this'll be interesting for Odetta, considering this is her turf (Germany). A hunter fighting in a land she knows can be a bit dangerous.

We're starting in Germany?

[Sonitusia]

Reviewing the current situation, this'll be interesting for Odetta, considering this is her turf (Germany). A hunter fighting in a land she knows can be a bit dangerous.

We're starting in Germany?

Not necessarily. But I can make a nice post about her later on if the situation grants it.

[Bentus]

We're starting in Germany?

Not necessarily. But I can make a nice post about her later on if the situation grants it.

We're in the Netherlands at the start of the RP, but I like the idea - definitely could make the war hit a bit more home for her.

Actually, good time to bring this up: if anyone has ideas for events or plots in the RP, or perhaps want to shift the group in a particular direction, shoot me a TG. While I've got an overarching scheme in mind, the individual steps of the RP are still in the works. I'm also open to having a couple of Co-OPs who would help out with apps/RPing major enemy actions, laying down the law, etc. Downside to being a Co-OP, I'll be giving you some spoilers and asking for input on where the RPs headed, so a bit of the fun surprise may be knocked out of things

[Senkaku]

I know, but presumably there are other human beings in that area (if there aren't, contact may be even more difficult due to, you know, alien death machines and such). I'm just saying it's unclear how these people will be introduced to one another, given their scattered-ness, even over a relatively small area. And since their access to most vehicles is probably now at least somewhat restricted by alien layz0rz, that complicates things further.

Just because the aliens broke through doesn't mean that they have control over the area. I should think there are enough military assets in the area to establish general evac routes for everyone to retreat along.

Right, but what I'm saying is why would all these highly disparate (militarily speaking) characters be even evacuating together? Some of them are Line soldiers, some are ex-ATHENA, some are UN command staffers, etc.

[Lunas Legion]

Perhaps the whole evacuation process went to shit for some reason, resulting in most of the properly organized formations losing cohesion and a whole load of ad hoc formations of varying sizes and composition forming in their place?

[Shyluz]

Perhaps the whole evacuation process went to shit for some reason, resulting in most of the properly organized formations losing cohesion and a whole load of ad hoc formations of varying sizes and composition forming in their place?

Dunkirk No. 2, anyone?

[Camicon]

Perhaps the whole evacuation process went to shit for some reason, resulting in most of the properly organized formations losing cohesion and a whole load of ad hoc formations of varying sizes and composition forming in their place?

Dunkirk No. 2, anyone?

Basically my thoughts. Except it's overland, and there are no communications, so none of the troops on the ground are getting direction or intelligence from their respective commands.

[Anowa]

Dunkirk No. 2, anyone?

Basically my thoughts. Except it's overland, and there are no communications, so none of the troops on the ground are getting direction or intelligence from their respective commands.

Battle of the Halbe 2.0 then?

[Camicon]

Basically my thoughts. Except it's overland, and there are no communications, so none of the troops on the ground are getting direction or intelligence from their respective commands.

Battle of the Halbe 2.0 then?

Sans the whole "being surrounded" thing. The aliens wouldn't have had time to establish a western front, I don't think.