2300AD: Star Marines - Episode 4

“I see no possible way in which tossing rigged explosives at the insane clown leader of homicidal convicts whilst telling everyone an orbital strike is incoming could possibly go wrong.” - PFC Gaylord LaPetre, Dunkelheim, May 2302 (SED)

While the squad members and homicidal convicts watched in surprise and horror as the block of explosives spun towards Governor Happy, SGT Korand lept up, and snatched it in mid-air, on the way down, he shoved it into the front of Happy’s baggy paints and kicked him forcefully under the surrounding walkway structure.

At the same time, the Noob, who had been a gymnastics star on his home colony, summersaulted over the circular bar in the middle of the room and landed behind one fo the thugs who was toting a flamethrower. With one fluid movement, the Noob amazingly snapped the convict’s neck.

Lenny bashed convict bearing the other flamethrower operator to the floor and readied the Squad Support Weapon. knocked out other guard.

Then Gaylord pulled out a second block of plastique, rammed a timer into it and tossed it onto walkway above his head. Unfortunately, it bounced repeated, finally rolling out of the front window of the bar. It fortuitously landed in the midst of the three convicts who stood guard at the front door.

In meantime, Jutta and Naci, Lt Boomer and Fireteam 2 moved up to the outskirts of town. Still linked by their comm systems, as soon as they heard the fight opening up, they opened fire on the convicts who were guarding the perimeter of the facility, knocking out the guards around the Uranus vehicle, in the towers, around perimeter of town. Boomer led Fireteam 2 up to secure the vehicle only to find it locked. In frustration, Boomer realized that Ms. White, who was in the bar with Fireteam 1, had the only electronic key.

Within the bar, SGT Korand next picked up a large metal table and swung it around the bar, bashing three convicts. He let go, hoping to knock out a ladder to the upper walkway but only narrowly missed downing Lenny.

Sanchez the merc, grabbed the flamethrower that was laying on the floor and fanned the flame on the upper walkway, killing one convict and suppressing the other three up there.

That was when the blocks of explosives went off.

Happy had somehow gotten the block out of his pants in time to save himself. BY tossing it away from himself, he managed to kill several of his bodyguards. The explosion at the front door killed all three of the guards there.

The convicts recovered from their initial shock and began firing at the party. However, the convicts got the worse of the exchange. While the rounds were flying, Governor Happy suddenly emerged from the twisted wreckage left by the explosion and plunged a huge knife into Ms. White’s chest.

She fell, bleeding out rapidly. Biff the Sung alien, avoided all the fire going on around it, ran to her, and began to apply first aid. Korand, who was nearby, picked up White’s beam rifle and fired it at Happy, missing the clown but knocking a hole in the thin metal walls at the rear of the building. Happy, seeing that he was outgunned, beat a retreat through the hole in the wall, screeching for help.

The convicts’ shots now began to tell. Both Korand and Gaylord were wounded. Then Sanchez yelled for everyone to duck. As Fireteam 1 dropped, she fanned the flamethrower out over the remaining convicts and the interior of the bar became an inferno who several of the convicts becoming horrible living torches.

Then the air was filled with the sound of engines as Happy reappeared aboard an armored truck surrounded by a host of heavily armed convicts mounted on a motley collection of vehicles. The convicts charged around the bar building, targeting Boomer, Jutta, and Fireteam 2 while trying to keep Fireteam 1 within the now burning bar.

Korand had run out of the hole in the wall and fired on these vehicles from behind. Jutta and Naci also opened up and the convicts were caught in a cross fire.

The convict vehicles exploded one by one. Finally, riddled with rounds, Happy’s big truck rolled to a stop directly in front of the doors to the bar. Fireteam 1 was just exiting the burning building and the Noob took aim with a grenade launcher he had picked up during the fight. He fired at point blank range, putting the final touch on Governor Happy’s reign.

The remaining convict vehicles, mostly motorcycles attempted to flee but were gunned down by Lenny who had followed Korand out of the rear of the building.

“I told you nothing could go wrong!” said Gaylord. He was the last to exit the building as it collapsed into a flaming ruin.

2300AD: Star Marines - Episode 3

As part of the Earth Forces' raid against the Kafer facilities on Dunkelheim, Lt Boomer and 1st Squad had been “recruited” to aid Ms. White, a representative of the Uranus Corporation, to recover corporate “property” at Site Beta which lay some 800 kilometers from the Marine drop zone.

Based on information from the local resistance, the maglev line originating in the Republic of Texas settlement at New Lubbock still seemed to be operational, under Kafer control however. A spur of the main line linked to Site Beta.

The group came up with the plan to drive overland the 500 klicks to New Lubbock and seize control of one of the trains and use it to infiltrate Site Beta.

They set off in the corporate scout vehicle. About an hour out, they encountered a single Kafer recon flying vehicle only to observe it fly into a hill side due to error on the part of the unawakened Kafer pilot.

Pilot Error

The next eight hours of the trip went uneventfully, except for Ms. White’s growing irritation at the endless puns on the Uranus Corporation name.

Further annoyance was caused by Biff (they can’t pronounce his full name) the Sung assistant the corporates had with them. The Sung are an intelligent reptilian race that was discovered in the Chinese Arm. After a brief war, they submitted to human domination in return for their “uplifting” to human technological levels. From a practical standpoint, the process of uplifting consists of making endless non sequitir inquiries into the nature of humans and their biological processes.

Then they saw the bug.

They grow them big around here

It was a perfect example of the indigenous kamelinsekt only instead of being a couple of centimeters in size, it was almost as big as the scout car. The group speculated from DNA modification to nuclear mutation as the cause of this prodigy but left the thing alone. The bug did not spot them and soon scurried out of their path.

The group then arrived at the outskirts of New Lubbock, around noon of the 40-hour Dunkelheim day. New Lubbock was a small Texan settlement of only a few thousand people. Before the Kafer invasion, it had been a penal colony with the prisoners being used to develop the petrochemical resources nearby.

The colony seemed deserted with a number of the buildings showing considerable battle damage. The group skirted the settlement to get to the maglev facility which appeared much more intact than the rest of the colony although it seemed equally deserted.

New Lubbock

Lt Boomer sent Fireteam 1 (SGT Korand, Gaylord, Machine-gun Lenny, and the Noob) and the resistence fighters, Jutta and Naci, to recon the settlement while he, Fireteam 2 and the corporate group remained with the vehicle in hiding some distance back.
Fireteam 1 took position on a mesa overlooking the rail facility. The mesa also contained a relay for communications satellites. Gaylord attempted to access the relay to determine what if any communications were occurring.

At the same time, a human figure appeared on one of the buildings and seemed to have observed the fireteam. His ragged appeareance suggested either a resistance member or refugee. Therefore Sgt Korand and the Noob approached him.

They seemed friendly

Several more of the ragged but well-armed locals appeared. Assuming they were resistance fighters who might help, Sgt Korand asked to be taken to their leader. The Noob volunteered that the rest of the team were on the mesa and Ms. White was “in back with the truck.” The locals told them to bring the rest of the group in.

While this was going on, Gaylord failed in every attempt to access the communications site, being able to determine only that a flash message had been sent out shortly after the locals spotted the team. He also couldn’t download any of the memory, track where it was sent or even shut it down.

Any job is easy with the right equipment

Machine Gun Lenny rectified this last point by urinating on the circuits. He noted that this is the way they turn off the TV at home. Gaylord then booby-trapped the relay station with a large piece of plastique.

(A new PC joined the group for this session and played one of the squad’s SSW operators, Machine Gun Lenny who had recovered from wounds suffered in the landings battle. He was an experienced Marine who loved to tell stories that no one believed and was from LA - Lower Alberta - there having been considerable changes to North American borders by 2300AD).

After this, the remainder of Fireteam 1 and the corporate folks join SGT Korand and the Noob in the maglev rail facility center. The LT and Fireteam 2 held their position out in the desert but listened in on coms. Jutta and her lone resistance fighter stayed in hiding on the mesa with a clear view of what was going on in the facility.

Once the corporate scout car was driven in, a very large group of heavily armed locals appeared from hiding and surrounded the group. It was then that they noticed that many of the wildly attired locals were sporting the bar code forehead tattoos that marked convicted felons in the Rep. of Texas. Although not disarmed, the group had slung their weapons and so were forced to follow the locals’ directions to see their boss.

They were taken into a large building that had been converted into a bar of sorts where they were introduced to the boss: Governor Happy, a huge, genetically modified serial killer in clown make-up. He let them know that had an arrangement with the Kafers to ensure that oil was shipped to the Kafers and that any resistance fighters would be killed or turned over.

He must be one of those "crying-on-the-inside" type of clowns

Although the Marines were not disarmed, their weapons were slung. Any attempt to draw them would result in them being blasted by the more than two dozen assault rifles and pair of a flamethrowers that were pointed in their direction.

SGT Korand, who is adept in …fabricating the truth, attempted to convince Happy that they were there to steal gold and other precious minerals being kept at Site Beta. With Happy’s help they could overcome the Kafer guards there and steal all that treasure. Korand even hinted that some of the more important convicts could be gotten off planet in a corporate starship.

At first Happy seemed inclined to merely torture the group into revealing where the gold was kept at Site Beta until Korand warned him that if the group didn’t return successfully to the Marine drop zone, a massive aerial strike would hit New Lubbock.

Happy seemed to buy into this whole notion when he remembered that he had alerted the Kafers to the Marines’ presence. Of course when he attempted to rescind the warning, he discovered that communications had been shut down Alberta-style.

So Gaylord was sent back up the hill to fix what he and Lenny had broken. He was escorted by two of the less bright convicts. Jutta was able to remain hidden and Gaylord was able to easily remove the booby trap he had placed and hide the explosive in his fatigues. He also fixed the relay station as well as sending on to Brigade HQ the fact that New Lubbock was being controlled by collaborators and producing petrochemicals for the Kafers.

Unfortunately, he unwittingly caused New Lubbock to move up on the Earth Forces list of targets to be destroyed.

Gaylord was the returned to the bar. He walked up to Happy and tossed the explosive into the clown’s lap….

This is not going to end well.

CROM! First Try at Conan-style Adventure Rules

I recently picked up the Crom rules from Matakishi’s Tea House and decided to give them a try on a snowy Saturday.

The rules are simple, fun, and fit the genre excellently. One of the players said that they so gave him the Conan mood, he went home and watched the Arnold movie after he left.

The mechanics are quite simple. Each character has a pool of dice that, at the beginning of the turn, allocates the dice to movement, combat, or special (everything else, magic, opening locks, etc.). Sequence is by card but dice allocated to special can be used to grab the initiative to move first.

Whatever is rolled on the movement dice is the number of inches moved.

Combat is resolved by the attacker deciding how many dice he wants to devote to an attack and then the defender chooses how many dice to use for defending against the attack. Both roll and the higher number wins, inflicting 2 points of damage plus 1 point of damage for each “6” that is rolled. Hits reduce the number of dice in the pool.

Special tasks require target numbers to be rolled: “6” for an average task, “12” for a difficult task.

Movement, combat and specials can be done in any combination. A player may voluntarily give up a dice for the duration of the scenario to count it as an automatic “6”

Main characters have large dice pools while lesser figures have only a few dice to spend and may have specific limits on how they are allocated. Thus Conan has 16 dice to divide any way he wishes while an average minion has only 2 movement dice and 2 combat dice. This allows for the recreation of the heroes reeving and smiting huge hordes of minions.

Magic is mostly for summoning evil creatures from another dimension (Conan actually took place in the Cthulhu universe) and lots of special dice are needed, allowing for interruption by any mighty-thewed barbarian who might happen by.

The only thing we thought that might need tweaking is the missile combat rules. Shooting is handled by the same rules as combat, attacker and defender roll dice to determine who wins except if the attacker loses they don’t suffer any hits. Because the table on which the game is played is intended to be small, there are no ranges for bows and such, the only limit is line of sight.

In our game, this led to the one player who was running Subotai, Conan’s sidekick from the original Arnold movie, to become the team sniper. He set up on the nearest high point and knocked off minions and whittled down major baddies for the other heroes to finish off in hand to hand.

We talked about adding some range modifiers or even some additional dice penalty for multiple shots taken in the same turn. This was the only problem we had with a delightful set of rules.

The rules contain a mini-campaign of 5 or 6 linked scenarios and this is what we ran with some modifications. I had three players who ran Conan, Red Sonja, and Subotai. They later picked up the wizard based on the character played by Mako in the movie. The goal was to rescue a princess who had been kidnapped by evil cultists to sacrifice her as part of a summoning ritual. Along the way they had to find the wizard, an ancient crown and a magic sword to fight the great evil. The final scenario had them breaking up the sacrifice. Below are some pictures from the game.

Slavers' Den in Shem where our heroes must rescue a wizard (We combined a couple of the scenarios from the rule set here).

Slavers' camp

Harassing the wrong lady

A rather inhospitable house of hospitality

Storming the prison

Surprising a Snake Priest

"The key's on the wall"

An early archeological dig

Disturbed scorpion

Cavern of Ancient Kings

Wako ambushed by skeletons

Inside the tomb of King Kull

The jungles of Kush

The Dark Citadel of Thoth Amon

A princess in distress

Battling to the rescue

Demon from another plane

"My Hero!"

2300AD: Star Marines - Episode 2

When we last left off, 3rd platoon had fended off a massive Kafer attack rather handily. This was not without casualties, including Jutta and the Noob. Barely had the dust settled when Ms. White, an agent of the Uranus Corporation (Motto: “Things come out differently at Uranus” - see The Grove Tube.) showed up along with her female mercenary bodyguard, Sanchez (a PC).

All Sanchez knew was that they were there to recover some corporate property at a place called Site Beta, about 800 klicks from the drop zone.

Then her boss, Ms. White begins examining the dead Kafers and the wounded Marines. Any that showed traces of Kafer DNA, those who had been wounded in hand-to-hand combat, were taken up in the Uranus vehicle with the intention they be sent to a corporate lab for further examination. This action was met with pretty tough resistance from the remainder of 3rd platoon and only the guarantee of immediate medical care permitted Ms. White to take custody of the characters.

In the meantime, 3rd platoon, along with its parent company, were relieved from the perimeter and placed in reserve at the Brigade HQ which was located at an old mining facility that was at the center of the Drop Zone. After a brief congratulatory interview with the Brigade Commander, General Cloche, Lt Boomer went to see his wounded personnel. Realizing the Uranus compound would be under tight security, he took along most of 3rd platoon with him.

Before he could arrive, the Noob and Jutta began waking from the sedation they received during their removal from the battlefield. They awoke to find themselves in hospital tent. The Noob overheard some of the doctors discussing the DNA find in his blood and ordered both patients restrained out of concern that they might somehow be affected by their contamination with the new Kafer DNA.

That was when they brought the two Kafers in.

At first, the two aliens appeared dead. Then one began moving, unbeknownst to the medical staff. Unable to move, the Noob watched with horror as the Kafer Eviscerator broke free from its restraints and approached a doctor from behind. As it began slaughtering the staff, the Noob and Jutta let out cries of terror. SGT Korand, who had been outside the hospital tent, broke in and blasted the creature with his plasma rifle.

Lt Boomer and the platoon arrived at this point and demanded the wounded be returned. A firefight was about to break out with Uranus Security when the General arrived. He had a protracted argument with Ms. White.

Ms. White insisted that orders National Command gave her the right to take custody of any patient she wanted and also required the General to provide troops to support her efforts to reach and secure Site Beta.

The General was forced to give in. However due to the needs of his primary mission of destroying the main Kafer facilities on planet, he informed White that the only help he could provide were the personnel she already had commandeered. The General, not trusting White, assigned Boomer and 1st squad, to which the Noob and Korand belonged, to be her escort to Site Beta, a long drive away.

A New Campaign: Star Marines 2300 A.D.

It’s been a while since I posted - real life has been hectic lately with some very good things and some very bad things. I haven’t had much chance to game let alone update the blog. Fortunately, things seem to be settling down a bit and we’ve stated a new campaign with my regular group. Although I won’t have time to do up a full narrative write-up, I’ll try to post periodic reports with pictures.

This is a scifi combination RPG and tabletop game about a platoon of US Marines in a war against an implacable alien enemy in the year 2302. The setting is that of the old GDW hard science RPG Traveller 2300 or, as later editions called it, 2300 A.D. We’ve actually been running this campaign off and on since about 1990. Wikipedia has a pretty good description of the setting:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2300_AD

For this round of the campaign, I’ve changed from the old GDW rules and gone with Combat: Alien War, a set of tabletop scifi skirmish rules written by Howard Whitehouse and derived from Astounding Tales! which is our go-to rules set.

As you can see from the photos, I’ve used quite a bit of Warhammer 40K and AT-43 figures and vehicles. One reason for this is that there are no suitable 28mm figures for the Kafers, who are biped carapaced aliens, so the Genestealer figures were a close substitute. Most of the Marines were old Grenadier and Coppelstone figures and the AT-43 figures fit in with them OK. But the main reason for this is economic. I picked up a very sizeable amount of AT-43 stuff that went on sale when that game hit the skids and my local game store had a flea market a few years back where I was able to pick the WH40K models, assembled and painted no less, for quite a bargain.

My apologies to any WH40K purists out there who are offended. Think of it as being like Firefly using old Starship Trooper armor for the Alliance troops.

The story so far:

A divided humanity has been fighting against the alien Kafers for seven years now, mostly in the Eta Bootis system at the end of the French Arm (“Stutterwarp” lightspeed travel technology in 2300AD is limited to jumps of 7.7 light years so human settlement is limited to systems that are no greater than that distance apart. This has formed three “arms” of settlement emanating from Earth, the American, Chinese, and French arms.)

Early in 2301, the Kafers launched a massive invasion to finally conquer the humans.

The Kafers are a unique alien species. Very powerful creatures, they tend to be of very low intelligence but undergo a rapid and profound increase in intelligence when under stress, a sort of adrenalin reaction. This means they desire and seek violence and conflict as a means of increasing awareness.

The Kafer invasion has proven generally successful despite fierce human resistance. It is now early 2302 and the humans have just lost a desperate months-long battle on planet Kimanjano. Although there are several human space squadrons scattered through the Arm, the main human reserve fleet is preparing for a last stand at Queen Alice’s Star. The Kafer battle fleet is regrouping at Kimanjano and will soon begin the final drive towards Earth.

The human alliance has come up with a plan, Operation Briar Patch, to launch a sudden large raid on the major Kafer supply and repair facility on the occupied planet Dunkelheim in the DM +36 2393 system. Intelligence from the human resistance reports that the only ships in the system are a few heavily damaged battleships and the ground garrison has been stripped to provide troops for the Kimanjano fight. As there are over 1 million human colonists on Dunkelheim (mostly German and Texan) living in close proximity to the Kafer facilities, bombardment from space is not an option.

A small task force of a few missile cruisers and assault transports will make the jump to Dunkelheim using lesser star lanes and land a ground force to smash the Kafer facilities there. The raiding force is built around the American 7th Marine Interface Brigade. It is estimated that, if surprise is achieved, the raiders should have 1 to 2 Earth weeks to complete the destruction before substantial Kafer reinforcements could be brought against them.

Most of the player characters are members of that force. These include:

1st LT H. Lejeune Boomer, platoon leader, 3rd Platoon, Bravo Company, 97th Marine Expeditionary Unit, 7th MIB, the younger son of a storied Marine family. He has only been in the field for about a year but is a seasoned veteran from the battles on Kimanjano where he lost most of his platoon.

S/SGT Aleron, leader of 1st Squad, 3rd Platoon, has been fighting Kafers for the entire war, having taken part in the initial fight with the Kafers at Arcturus Station. He is from the heavy gravity mining world of King and is heavily genetically modified like all residents of that hellish world.

CPL Larissa Cusmano, fireteam leader, 1st Squad, 3rd Platoon, veteran of three combat tours, she is a highly respected leader. She once killed a Kafer with a hairdryer.

PFC Gaylord Lapetre, driver and marksman, 1st Squad. A resident of Old New New Orleans (the Big Easy has suffered repeated devastations over the centuries from hurricanes, fires, radiations, and overly-successful Mardi Gras resulting in the city simply being rebuilt several times over the rubble. Unfortunately, the lower levels were often still inhabited.) He is a former shoe-salesman who much prefers his current line of work.

PVT Arben Johnstone, asst’ gunner, 1st squad, “The Noob.” Fresh out of AIT as part of the replacements for the decimated 3rd Platoon, this is his first combat operation. He can make tasty soup from almost anything. He snores badly.

The Task Force 97 was able to make the several jumps necessary to get to Dunkelheim undetected. The four Cruisers of the escort managed to destroy the four damaged Kafer battleships but three of the Cruisers were heavily damaged, with one being required to return to human space. Nonetheless, the landing of the 7th Brigade commenced.

3rd Platoon landed in three Hammerhead Armored Planetary Interface Vehicles (APIV). Awaiting them was a small group of resistance fighters, led by another PC, LT. Jutta Zweig, a former Colonial Policewoman, who operated a landing beacon to guide them in.

Lt. Boomer managed to guide the platoon down to the designated landing zones, avoiding most anti-aircraft fire. Unfortunately, he smashed his own APIV on an outcrop, reducing it to half speed.

The Platoon quickly took up positions without opposition. Landings by the rest of the Brigade proceeded of pace. However, it was soon discovered that the platoon's water reserve had been destroyed in the landing and 2nd Squad was sent back to Battalion headquarters in the damaged APIV to fetch more.

Shortly thereafter, a Kafer reconnaissance aircraft wandered over their position and began an ineffectual fire. The Kafer pilots proved to be amongst the dimmest (In game terms, to simulate the changing nature of Kafer intelligence, most Kafers start as green troops but once under fire, would roll against their combat value, and if successful, would become rated as veterans, with the chance increased by each shot placed against them.) Despite several strikes on their vehicle, including one that knocked out their communications, the Kafer pilots remained only vaguely aware of the danger they were until there vehicle was destroyed by a combination of railgun and missile fire, crashing landing within 3rd Platoon lines.

When our heroes went to investigate it, the Noob managed to step into a kamelinsekt (the primary native species is a termite-like insect that lives in burrowing colonies of enormous size.) Then the LT nearly got himself skewered by the one surviving Kafer pilot who, after the crash, was only too aware of its predicament. Missing its one chance, the Kafer was ignominiously gunned down.

Word soon came that the main Kafer field force, garrisoned in the planetary capital of Goldberg about 20 kilometers away, was moving against the landing zone. 3rd Platoon and rest of Bravo Company could expect a full assault in less than an hour.

The Platoon dug in just in time. 1st squad, one fireteam from second squad, and the German resistance fighters formed the perimeter. The remaining fireteam, the heavy weapons squad and the platoon command would form the reserve.

Not having received accurate information about the Marines’ position from their hapless recon flight, the Kafer stumbled into 3rd Platoon’s position. It was here the 3rd Platoon’s luck began to run hot. The LT was able to contact higher echelon and get the support of a section of the Brigade’s heavy artillery. Added to this was fire from the railgun mounted on 1st Squad’s APIV and the platoon mortar. All of this blasted into a target rich environment.

As the Marines dealt with the conventional infantry attack, suddenly a horde of strange creatures rushed forward. These were a new subspecies of Kafer, bearing no weapons but having nasty clawed and bladed limbs, they moved far faster than the normally sluggish Kafers. A huge mob reached the bottom of cliffs where the resistance fighters had dug in. Here was where our heroes luck again kicked in. These Kafer “eviscerators” received a mistaken order to fall back just as they reached the human line. (In game terms, on my initiative roll, I receive a WTF result that directed one of my units to be retreated. The players got to choose which one and chose to retreat the eviscerator unit.)

While this was going on, the 1st squad main position, consisting of SGT Korand, Machine-Gun Lenny, the squad support weapon operator, and the Noob, were laying down some very effective fire. The Noob in particular beating the odds (he needed to roll a 2 or less on a 6 sided dice)and killing several Kafers, including a couple of Kafer leaders.

It was then that Lenny was hit by a round from a Kafer thud gun. While SGT Korand worked to save the Marine’s life, the Noob opened fire on the Kafers, killing the Kafer “company” commander who had directed the fire that wounded Lenny.

At was at this point that the Kafer infantry attack turned out to be a ruse to uncover the main line of human resistance. Two large Kafer “Death Sled” hover tanks, bearing large main guns and lasers, appeared and were set to roll right over 3rd Platoon.

Here again 3rd Platoon’s luck came into play. While the Death Sleds’ fire mostly missed, one sled was immobilized by Lepetre’s rail gun fire. The other sled was hit by an RPG fired by one of the resistance fighters and then suffered a hit from the Noob who grabbed SGT Korand’s plasma rifle and fired it point blank at the sled’s weakly armored undercarriage. The plasma blast penetrated and knocked out the main armament.

The hover tanks’ lackluster performance did mask the few remaining Kafer infantry and eviscerators. These leapt onto the cliff where Jutta and her men were dug in. The humans proved to be no match for the half dozen eviscerators who overran the position, killing most of the troops there and severely wounding Jutta.

Likewise, one eviscerator had crept close to the Noob’s position. It struck out at the kid and managed to slice him up before falling to the Noob’s close range plasma bolt.

At this point, the remaining Death Sled exploded as a strange heavily armored ground vehicle appeared over the horizon and fired a heavy laser into the damaged alien craft. The remaining Kafers began to fall back.

Despite approaching from the Battalion landing zone, the newcomer was not a Marine vehicle. On its hull was the logo of the Uranus Corporation.