by Dean Henegar
DrizztforPres, Archer
Ugghh… another lame name. The weasel-faced player wore a dark leather vest and carried a short bow across his back. A pair of long daggers were sheathed at his side.
“Noob, it’s easy to talk big when you’re not in a pvp zone. How bout we make us a little duel, so all my new fans here can watch me pwn you?”
A prompt appeared in front of me.
Challenge: HaxxorSupreme420 and his companion DrizztforPres have challenged you to an honor duel.
Accept: Y/N (Selecting no will lower your reputation considerably; you can toggle off honor duels in your settings tab.) Winning a duel will result in a very slight increase in reputation, losing will result in a very small decrease in reputation.
Great, I guess I was a noob after all. I had left myself wide open for these kinds of things and didn’t even know it. Cursing the AI, Clio, and her lack of a tutorial, I quickly toggled off the honor duel option in my settings, but the challenge prompt was still there.
“It will cost more to not accept and while I’m sure that with their better gear and my gimped class they will wipe the floor with me… I’ll give it a shot,” I thought to myself while hitting accept.
Loading Honor Duel. Good luck competitors!
My screen faded, and I found myself and Sergeant Brooks standing in an open field about thirty feet away from our opponents. Those spectating could be seen as blurry figures at the edge of the instanced duel area. They had a perfect view of the action, but we wouldn’t see them in order to prevent anything they did or said from distracting us. More prompts flashed.
Loading commander class forces.
What? I thought it was just going to be me and maybe the sergeant vs these guys. I grinned as four squads of Imperium soldiers loaded onto the battlefield. It was beginning to look like we had a chance. A countdown to battle timer began to tick.
30,29,28…I had to act quick.
“Sergeant Brooks, take 4th squad and move to our extreme right. When the battle starts, ignore Haxxor and charge the archer. Keep him from shooting and try to surround him for flanking attacks. I’ll take the other three squads and start wearing down Haxxor. I have a feeling these guys have us overpowered by a lot, but we have discipline and numbers on our side. 4th squad, move out with Sergeant Brooks. Squads 1 through 3 form up ranks and prepare javelins.”
3,2,1… The battle begins!
The invisible force that had been holding the two groups apart vanished. Our opponents looked at us dumbfounded, clearly confused as to how all these other soldiers had spawned on my side. A second was all we needed to get moving. Sergeant Brooks and his ten-man squad began sprinting for the archer. I had to hold Haxxor’s attention away from Brooks. I had arranged my soldiers in three ranks of ten and I stood behind the third rank to issue orders. I made a point to always have my squads within my command presence aura as I activated it. We would need every bonus we could get. My soldiers were equipped as standard soldiers with no armor, a large wooden shield like the one I carried, a crude short sword, and two javelins. The gear for these generic instance zone soldiers was at least a bit better than the gear my other soldiers had.
I began to bark orders.
“All squads prepare to throw...throw!” Thirty-one javelins launched at Haxxor. He dodged at the last minute and many missed completely. Several that hit him bounced off his armor, but a few left bloody holes where they hit and Haxxor’s health bar dipped a tiny bit. While I examined his health bar, two soldiers from my front rank fell with arrows in their chests. The archer had gotten over his confusion and was firing on my group. Haxxor now began to charge us, his figure blurring a bit as he activated some ability to increase his dodge chance and speed.
“All squads throw and prepare to receive charge!” Twenty-nine javelins rained down on Haxxor, but his high defense rating only allowed a few to connect. My troops raised shields and drew their short swords. The barbarian, Haxxor, activated another ability and swung his great axe from side to side as he broke the first rank of soldiers. Two soldiers were cut completely in half from the ability my combat log showed as Massive Swipe. Three more of my men were hacked down in just as many seconds while my troops recovered and began to fight back.
Haxxor’s charge had broken through the first rank, but the second rank had time to brace and stopped him penetrating further. The second rank of soldiers began to surround the barbarian, making thrusts with their short swords when the opportunity arose. I pulled back five feet with 3rd squad and commanded the remainder of first squad to fill any holes that 2nd squad may have. Only six of my soldiers at a time could get at Haxxor without getting in each other’s way.
Haxxor continued to swing his axe, almost every swing resulting in a dead soldier. His axe only occasionally deflected off a shield. My soldiers had a hard time piercing his armor and each hit only removed a tiny sliver of health. Lucky for us, each time he swung the axe it left him open for at least one of the soldiers surrounding him to land a hit.
I took a moment to look for Sergeant Brooks across the battlefield. His force had made it to the archer and now had him surrounded. He wasn’t without loss either as I saw two of the sergeant’s soldiers had gone down from arrows before they could close to melee range. The archer didn’t have anywhere near the melee skill or defense that Haxxor had, but Brooks still had a fight on his hands. One more of Brooks soldiers dropped as I was watching, the archer opening his throat with a long dagger. A splash of blood hit the other soldiers as they began to land several blows on the archer. The archer was accumulating injuries quickly and his smaller health pool was dropping fast. It looked like Sergeant Brooks was winning his fight.
Turning back to my fight I could see 2nd squad was down to three soldiers and 1st squad had only four remaining.
“3rd squad, prepare to fill in any gaps. Bring down that barbarian!” Haxxor was becoming slower in his movements, and it looked like his wounds were piling up. The health bar now below half. I noticed my troops were beginning to get more hits in as the blurring buff Haxxor had been using from the start of the fight ran out.
After a minute of trading blows back and forth, my three squads were down to seven soldiers, but Haxxor was nearly done for. Just when I thought I had this fight in the bag, a red glow covered our opponent and he visibly grew six inches taller. His muscles bulged as he unleased a new special barbarian rage ability that enabled him to gain some health back. Haxxor did a spinning whirlwind attack taking down three of my remaining soldiers and I stepped into the gap that opened, thrusting with all my strength at the half-orc barbarian. My blow hit him in the stomach, piercing his armor as the sword sunk in three inches before my opponent pulled away. Dark red blood welled from the wound and blended with blood from the dozens of other cuts that Haxxor had taken during the fight. Haxxor’s health dropped to just a sliver. My remaining soldiers quickly scored two additional hits while the barbarian was focused on me, nearly causing him to go down. It was my turn to face the axe now as Haxxor used an ability called Power Attack, looking to split me from head to toe. I raised my shield just in time to block some of the force of the blow.
With his enhanced strength behind the blow, Haxxor’s axe had cleaved halfway through my shield, severing my shield hand at the wrist while doing so. Shocked and nauseous from the waves of pain radiating from my newly severed limb, I watched as each beat of my heart pumped a red stream of blood from the stump where my hand used to be. The shield dropped as I was no longer able to hold it without a hand, snagging Haxxor’s axe as it fell. I could feel my life force slipping away from the blood loss as my health bar plummeted toward zero. Haxxor began pulling at his axe in a futile effort to free it from the shield it was embedded in. The last four soldiers in my group all landed hits on the distracted Haxxor, finishing him just before I bled out.
Victory! You have defeated your opponent and gained reputation!
We were ported back to the same spot in town immediately after the duel. Trying t
o catch my breath I looked down to see my hand was back and we were all fully healed, and our gear repaired upon leaving the duel instance. Bystanders began to cheer, and I watched with amusement as HaxxorSupreme420 stared at me with a scowl on his face.
“Noob, you just got lucky. You unlocked some cheater, pay-to-win class,” Haxxor stated. “Why don’t you accept another duel coward. You know your little tricks won’t work this time.” Haxxor must have tried to start another duel, not knowing I had figured out how to disable the setting.
“Sorry, smacking you down once is all I have time for…noob,” I said to Haxxor as Sergeant Brooks and I continued on our way.
Chapter 7
After our little exercise with the poorly named duo, we headed once more toward the supply depot.
“Sergeant, do we get any choice for our troops or are they being assigned to us?” I inquired.
“Sir, normally for this type of mission we could choose our own troops from any available in the garrison. Unfortunately, like yourself, I just arrived here and haven’t had time to scope out which soldiers have potential and which ones will only be dead weight. From what I’ve seen, the troops here are green. Really green, as in just finished basic training green. From the state of their physical conditioning, most barely passed their final physical fitness PT test. There are also several rear area pogues, but they won’t be of much use where we’re going,” Sergeant Brooks said, while shaking his head.
“From what I gather Sergeant, it will take about two weeks to get to the edge of this zone. Hopefully, between the two of us we can whip them into combat ready shape while on the road,” I said, while concentrating on Sergeant Brooks to open his information.
Sergeant Josiah Brooks, NPC
Abilities:
Command Presence: A less powerful version of the command presence ability the commander has. This ability will improve as the NPC progresses. The ability does not stack with other instances of the same ability. The more potent of the two will be the one in effect.
Well, it looked like Sergeant Brooks was a definite upgrade over our standard soldiers. Our command presence abilities didn’t stack but having two of us with the ability should make sure the useful buff was on our soldiers at all times. It will be interesting to see how our abilities will improve as we level up. After our duel, I could foresee good leadership making even mediocre troops a force to be reckoned with.
A pleasantly cool breeze was blowing in from the nearby lake, making the hot day bearable. The streets of Amerville were a hard-packed dirt that allowed for easy, if dusty, travel and I could imagine the same streets would transform into a quagmire of mud during the rainy season. Located only a short distance from the headquarters, we soon arrived at the cavernous supply building. The massive double doors of the wooden depot were opened allowing the breeze to help cool the large warehouse. The interior was a disorganized hodgepodge that contained various racks and stacks of boxes holding the equipment and supplies that were needed by the town garrison. Soldiers, supply clerks, and even civilians were coming and going in a disorganized chaos. I had to suspect that a lot of the gear meant for our soldiers walked out the door after seeing the lax security of the building. How much more were we going to have to pay for gear to cover the losses from sloppy leadership? The sergeant and I stepped into the building unchallenged and walked up to the counter asking for the quartermaster.
A short, chubby man sporting three days’ worth of stubble appeared. He was wearing a stained, unbuttoned, mismatched uniform. The chubby man immediately began berating us for interrupting him, while barely glancing up from the paper report he was reading.
“I hope you both have a good reason for interrupting…” the quartermaster began
“Attention!” shouted Sergeant Brooks, cutting off the quartermaster with the booming voice that every NCO since time began seemed to acquire.
“You will go to attention, quartermaster, in the presence of an officer!” Brooks indicated me, whom the quartermaster hadn’t noticed.
“We’re here to be issued gear for our troops by order of the camp commander. I suggest you get some of your people working on what we need before I report you for insubordination. Not to mention your non-regulation uniform and overall poor hygiene,” Sergeant Brooks added.
The quartermaster wasn’t used to many officers coming by and appeared to be flustered as he assigned one of his people to help us. “Krebbs, get over here and help the Lieutenant with his supplies. My apologies, sir. I didn’t notice you. Krebbs is my best supply clerk and he’ll get you squared away quickly.” The quartermaster fumbled to properly button his tunic as Krebbs rushed up to assist.
The quartermaster apologized again and excused himself, wisely wanting to get out from under the laser death stare of Sergeant Brooks. Having him hide out somewhere in the warehouse while we conducted our business was fine with all parties involved.
“Sorry if I overstepped my bounds, sir,” Sergeant Brooks said to me. “I have trouble not snapping back into drill instructor mode when I see soldiers acting like slobs.”
“No apology needed Sergeant, but try not to ruffle too many feathers until after we get our troops their gear,” I advised while watching Krebbs step to the counter and take our requisition form. Shaking my head, I realized that Sergeant Brooks had said drill instructor and not drill sergeant. He had used the Marine Corps designation of their training cadre and not the Army one.
“Even ultra-advanced AI’s can’t be smart all the time, I guess,” I said under my breath, remembering the friendly rivalry that the two branches had with each other. I could vaguely recall an old Marine in the hospital with me and the two of us picking on each other for our choice of service branch. During a fight though, neither branch would hesitate to risk their lives to save the other.
“Sir,” Krebbs began. “It looks like you’ve been authorized 30 days rations for two squads plus yourselves.” Krebbs looked around to see if any of the other clerks were watching. “I’ll make sure there’s extra rations and that they come from the freshest supplies. It’s worth the risk just to have seen the quartermaster dressed down by the sergeant, sir.” I normally would jump all over the supply clerk for insulting a superior, but I let it slip since the quartermaster was a complete train wreck and I firmly believed in never messing with the man who supplies my soldiers.
Krebbs read further into the supply requisition. “You may have guessed that you will not be getting the pick of the litter with the quality of troops we have here. No offense sir, but we seem to get stuck with either leftover dregs or green recruits.”
“Seeing the quality, or lack thereof, of the gear the men are initially assigned, I would highly suggest using at least some of the discretionary funds that were allocated to you for upgrading your soldiers’ gear. They come out of training rather poorly equipped and since they were being assigned off post, none of the other officers wanted to spend resources on them. Here is a list of starting equipment for them.” Krebbs held up a parchment and the information loaded onto my screen confirming the soldiers here had the same crap gear my original squad started with.
“I can’t offer anything in the way of discounts, but depending on what you want, and with your permission, I may have some used or leftover gear that can go for less coin. Despite being used, the gear is solid enough to serve for a while until you can afford better,” Krebbs offered while I looked at the soldier loadout.
Standard loadout, level 1 recruit.
Crude Worn Bronze dagger
Small round wooden shield (poor quality). Warning, this shield has a chance to shatter if struck by a heavy blow or critical hit.
Standard uniform, poor quality: This rough spun cloth will not provide much protection and the poor quality will make it wear quicker. (Note, uniforms for troops directly assigned to your command will automatically match your preferred color scheme.)
Poor quality leather sandals: Wearers will have a small chance to stumble when attacking or defe
nding due to the poor quality of this footwear.
Standard military rucksack: Average quality. This large backpack can hold the standard gear and supplies for a soldier in the field.
The starting gear was pathetic. The rucksack was the only piece worth keeping and none of the items I would expect an Imperial soldier in the field to have were present. I needed to upgrade their gear, but my funds were limited and after sixty days I would have to start paying these soldiers. I didn’t want to spend more than forty gold, so I would make the remainder last if possible.
“Sergeant Brooks, what’s your opinion on the most important upgrades for the men? Our budget will only be about forty gold” I asked Brooks, who seemed a little surprised that an officer would request his opinion.
Sergeant Brooks contemplated for a moment. “We plan on training them while we travel, so that lousy footwear has to go. The sandals would wear out by the end of the first week. The shields would be the next thing. The ones they are issued look like old captured enemy equipment. Better to get them the shields they originally trained with and which are the best overall.” Sergeant Brooks indicated the larger shields both he and I carried. “The daggers are useless for anything other than cutting their food. Short swords, at a minimum, are a necessity if we’re going to be effective in formation battle. Armor is likely out as an option due to the cost and the time required to get that many soldiers properly fitted. Upgrading the shields and hitting the shield training hard will keep them alive longer than any armor we could afford at this point anyway. We can have the men slowly improve their armor as we go. Javelins should also be inexpensive enough to equip and would give us some short-ranged punch. They can also double up as a short spear in a pinch.”
Thinking for a moment, I knew what else we were missing. “The other major thing I think we’re missing, Sergeant, would be a pick or shovel for each soldier. The Imperium is known for its fortified camps each night.” (I made that assumption based on this faction being a close copy of ancient Rome). Two axes per squad to cut wood and make defensive stakes is also key.” Scratching absently at my itchy uniform, there was one more thing that HAD to change. “These uniforms seem to have been made out of old burlap sacks. Do you have anything that won’t leave my men and I itching all day, Krebbs?”