[Official event] Journey of the Argonauts

[Promotheus]

Keeping @NBK 's example, some feedback from my end:

1. Faster respawn timers, I get it was at 15 minutes to prevent people from swarming the Argonaut but if that truely becomes an issue just have it follow the last instruction on regular speed (80/s) until it actually breaks away. People left due to them getting bored and having to catch up.
2. As @Fab mentioned the event would have benefited greatly from a 'respawn ship' on both sides, especially with the route being all over the place.
3. As people mentioned Kepler wasn't exactly ideal, I get that it's between Kusari and Liberty but the narrow paths on top of the confusion of the hackers made it more frustrating than fun, Galileo would have suited better.
4. The hacker ambush was a cool idea, but the execution was bad. Cut down their numbers in half (5 instead of 10 in their group), put them in regular snubs instead. Announce their participation as a mission update to both groups and make them rp taking control of the Argonaut afterwards so people know its legit. Make their unique hook they can hack from longer range (they're hackers after all) and have the argonaut fly off as per point 1 until the hackers are dealt with or break away. This way they have their moment to shine as a plottwist, the ability to steal the argonaut and dont lolslaughter every ship while the players are still trying to figure out why this random faction that isn't in the event is suddenly doing event things.
5. You mentioned an engine stall was planned once the ship was intercepted, which never happened. Just have it stall, it's been adrift in space for god knows how long, it can have engine troubles. (This wouldn't have mattered in the event due to all the confusion and the ensuing fight in Galileo keeping almost all the ships occupied, but with mission updates that might not have happened).
6. Put the jump hole that's specifically made so a side can join the event (Like the one Kusari needed for Earheart in this event) at an extremely hard to miss place like right infront of the Arch' docking point. There were a -lot- of people looking for that.

Honestly though, even with all the proposed changes, positives and negatives of the event, this could have been a lot more fun and clear had there been better (/any) communication, I had to PM the Argonaut with several questions just to understand what was going on, one of which being if the event had even started yet or not. (Much thanks for responding btw! I forwarded the answers to the rest of the group so people knew at least something)

• Announce the start;
  
• Announce when the Argonaut jumps systems and to which one (I believe this only happened for Kepler);
  
• Announce plottwists like the hackers attacking;
  
• Announce people can chase after the argonaut for the duration of the event (at least I certainly hope that was the case, the Kusari chat was full of people worried they'd get sanctioned for flying after the event objective once it entered Liberty);
  
• Announce it stalling if there's an engine failure;
  
• Have a clear entrance and exit point for the factions to escort the objective to (and communicate this), Kusari at one point had control of the Argonaut only to realize they had nowhere to go with it.
  

Lastly you'll always have people that only care about blues and ignore the objective and that definitely happened here, but there would have been more people playing the objective if they had any idea what was going on.

[Barrier]

I want to add to what Jammi said, while including some numbers from my Argonaut pov. I will try to outline where we made mistakes, but also where there was opportunity for various sides to "catch up".

• The server was live from right around 6:12PM. Aka people could log back in at this time.
  
• It took me 8 minutes to check things and set-up the updated Argonaut in position. Right after this, I announced that a jump hole to earhart was available from Tohoku in sector C5. Unfortunately, I screwed up the details, as its true position was closer to D5/6, 5k off-plane.
  
• I was informed that the hole said "Tau-23", which is why I included the fact that the exit was mis-labeled in the console message. I realize now that I should've been more clear about this, and repeated the message with more accurate info later. I did inform someone in the KNF group about this, so I was hoping they would pass it along, but I should've also sent another console msg.
  
• At 6:26pm, I sent out the event start message, because I saw a good amount of Kusari and Liberty players in Earhart.
  
• At this point, Kusari side is already around me, as I presume they used jump drives. I ask for directives, but no one responds, as a big battle starts further away. We wait about 5 minutes before someone gives me the order to follow them.
  
• Soon after, a fight breaks out, and it's clear from the first few minutes that 2k is too generous, as Liberty snubs are able to delay me while still being able to dodge with minimal issues. I wait a bit longer and make the announcement about the reduced range to 1k. Ironically, this apparently ends up affecting the Kusari side more, who are much lighter in terms of hp.
  
• At 6:48pm, I am now in Liberty's control, and asking about where to go. I am directed to "Zurich", as Kusari stragglers delay my progress briefly. I warn the Liberty side that something is off by repeatedly saying "Attention: rift is unstable.", but I am told to resume course. By this time, I see that some people have made it through, but no one tells me to abort, so I assume people are ok with duking things out in Kepler. Of note, I do not know which exit is Kepler, as I deliberately didn't double check to keep it a surprise for myself.
  
• At this point, the Argonaut is pathetically pleading for someone to send it a course, as the deathmatch resumes. The hacker reveal happens at around 6:57pm. There is plenty of hard fighting happening around Ames between all 3 sides, as I wait to see if anyone can provide me data. Note that at this point, if someone took it upon themselves to escort me through Shikoku, I would have followed.
  
• With no one stepping up, I take matters into my own hands to progress the event. The Argonaut receives a friendly message from Ames with coordinates, and follows its last objective given to it by the hackers. This happens at around 7:10pm. The Argonaut slowly moves through the corridor towards the Colorado hole, as my thruster is gone.
  
• At 7:23pm, the Argonaut jumps through to Colorado. By this time, most people could have respawned from the earlier fights, and use the latest information to set up an ambush there. But no one waits for the hackers.
  
• At 7:29pm, the Argonaut has made it to the Ontario hole.
  
• At 7:36pm, the Argonaut has made it to Cochrane, but we decide to prolong the event. The Argonaut receives a last-resort attack from the Liberty side to shut down, which I announce will last 10 minutes.
  
• In the final minutes of the shut-down, Liberty brings a bunch of heavies, and some players remember about the destruction threshold, so they begin shooting me to deny me to the hackers. At this point, my game crashes (perhaps due to reaching the threshold?), and I have to leave due to irl stuff so I figure it's a decent end to the event. I do manage to send out one last message about the ship jettisoning its cargo.
  

So in short, I could have and should have provided more information, but people also had plenty of time to re-group and set up a blockade. I think for the future, I will plan with even longer transit times in mind. However, do note that the Argonaut was disabled before the end without too much dev interference, so people still did good when they were able to organize.

I also apologize to the Kusari side, but the moment the Argonaut slipped away towards Colorado, we could not retain you without creating a substantially OORP situation where the KNF essentially invades Colorado, hence why I told people who asked to switch to the KOI id if possible. It was essentially luck of the draw that people chose the Kepler exit, which is arguably more Liberty-favored. I hope people enjoyed the fights - with 78 kills this event was definitely up there in terms of points (Cannae had 115 kills, but also involved the biggest faction of the server and their main opponents).

[Lord Caedus]

• At 6:48pm, I am now in Liberty's control, and asking about where to go. I am directed to "Zurich", as Kusari stragglers delay my progress briefly. I warn the Liberty side that something is off by repeatedly saying "Attention: rift is unstable.", but I am told to resume course. By this time, I see that some people have made it through, but no one tells me to abort, so I assume people are ok with duking things out in Kepler. Of note, I do not know which exit is Kepler, as I deliberately didn't double check to keep it a surprise for myself.
  
• At this point, the Argonaut is pathetically pleading for someone to send it a course, as the deathmatch resumes. The hacker reveal happens at around 6:57pm. There is plenty of hard fighting happening around Ames between all 3 sides, as I wait to see if anyone can provide me data. Note that at this point, if someone took it upon themselves to escort me through Shikoku, I would have followed.
  
• At 7:23pm, the Argonaut jumps through to Colorado. By this time, most people could have respawned from the earlier fights, and use the latest information to set up an ambush there. But no one waits for the hackers.

Just a bit of feedback here, and told from the LN side of things.

The messages about the jump hole being unstable when directed to Zurich were very much too vague. It didn't actually get the intent of the message across at all, perhaps a console message saying the exits would randomly be Kepler or Copernicus? "Unstable" is a very specific thing in relation to jump holes, so if you wanted to do it outside of a console message, say that sensors indicate the two systems in local, but cannot determine which leads where? "Be advised, sensors show jump hole will lead to either copernicus or kepler." Also literally nobody was aware that it was even possible that the exits weren't going to be what was shown in game (That being Tau-23 and Zurich)

It was unclear exactly what the directions to be given to the Argonaut should have been. Were we supposed to give you grid coords which you can't see while in Kepler? I know I dropped a line about proceeding down the "cleared channel" at the argonaut.

With the hackers not being a part of the even writeup, it was assumed that they would be heading for their much closer base (to kepler and also incidentally to copernicus) in Galileo. The ambush being launched by the hackers should have probably included a console message detailing what their intent was.

---

[jammi]

Outcomes

• If Liberty acquires the Argonaut, it will "jump start" their progress in the latest Sirian technological arms race.
  
• If Kusari acquires the Argonaut, they will impede their primary rival and gain critical diagnostic insights into drives under extreme strain.
  
• ????: The Lane Hackers acquire the Argonaut, secreting it away to Cochrane Base. They will begin the work to understand what they have stolen and its value.

---

After transiting through the Alaska Super Gate into Earhart, the LSF taskforce initially made good speed. Relying on the scant data recovered from surviving drones, they avoided the obvious hazards nestled in the pocket’s centre. The Argonaut-3 latched onto the Niyodo’s reactor section and began to tow it away. As the expedition moved towards an anticipated exit-point, the situation shifted drastically.

A drive rift opened and expelled a Kusari strike group, transponders disabled. While the LSF has long been aware of Kusari jump drives -- schemed to defeat them, even -- it was still an unpleasant shock to be on the receiving end of their abilities. The KOI were horrified to find they were too late, the reactor had already been acquired by their rivals. Records next become garbled and confused, and it is unclear which side fired first.

What is known is this distant and alien frontier became a bloodbath, as the two House’s agents tore one another apart. The LSF successfully disengaged from this first clash, however their escape left the convoy in terminal peril. The exit point led to Kepler, a morass of deadly dark matter and gravitational hazards. While the LSF had painstakingly mapped the shifting tunnels of relative safety in previous months, they were not permitted a free hand to retreat. Soon after, regrouped KOI survivors pursued through the exit point and the battle began anew.

Ames was thrown into disarray by the chaos, as Liberty and Kusari ships fought and died in the safe zone surrounding the station. Soon the local neural net was ablaze, attracting the malign attention of the Lane Hackers. A squadron launched from Leiden Base was first to respond, arriving on the scene to confront the handful of surviving KOI operatives. This confrontation was merciless, with the Hackers soon after inheriting the Argonaut-3 and overriding its automated protocols.

The Hackers were not quite sure what they had obtained, but it was evidently capital ship wreckage of great value. They determined Cochrane Depot’s drydock was the best place to take it, and made off towards Colorado. The journey to Ontario was calm, despite Colorado itself being in uproar. Nothing was being reported on the neural net, but clearly some sort of transmission had escaped from Kepler. The Liberty Navy had been ordered to maximum alert and were preparing to reinforce the border.

All LSF stations had also been placed at maximum readiness, and briefed on the strange energy readings the scout drones had detected emanating from the Niyodo’s reactor. It was exactly these readings that caught the attention of an LSF patrol flying off the Battlecruiser Lehigh. A sudden spike in exotic radiation was detected in the gap between the St Lawrence Ice Field and the North Ontario Debris Sea. Another interception, another bloody combat, joined part-way through by dogged KOI trackers. The LSF’s mission CO quickly surmised the tide was turning and determined that the component must be destroyed rather than lost to Liberty's enemies.

Critical damage was inflicted on the Argonaut, but the Hackers were successful in driving their pursuers off. The thieves vanished into the debris field, and arrived at Cochrane Depot with their dilapidated prize in tow. Despite this, one of their own had been forced to eject, and was now aboard an LSF interceptor heading for the Lehigh and an uncertain fate. The heist of the decade has overturned an ant hill. The attention of the LSF is now, more than ever, fixed on Ontario, while the Navy waits to see what response may yet come from the north.

---

News article library, feedback and content requests.

[Barrier]

The leaderboard results have been updated into the OP.

Just a reminder that all rewards now require some sort of RP to claim, in addition to what is outlined under the specific heading. If you have any questions, pm me on discord.

[Leeon26]

Am I allowed to pick 3 fighter codes or how do the rewards add up? Wanting 6 codes for a whole loadout would need 18 kills? o.o
If it's only 3 fighter codes I'll rather take one cruiser repeater

-Cipher-2

[Barrier]

Am I allowed to pick 3 fighter codes or how do the rewards add up? Wanting 6 codes for a whole loadout would need 18 kills? o.o
If it's only 3 fighter codes I'll rather take one cruiser repeater

-Cipher-2

Yes you have it right, it's one code per choice.

Please write some RP about what happened and link it to receive the repeater

[TheSauron]

Natsu.Kitamura 3

I'd like to put my reward up for grabs. Writing up an inRP report just to get one (1) snub gun is more time and effort than going out to craft it directly.

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One MD Admiral

[Vendetta]

Claiming a forum title for participation as A/)-Leviathan, outlined in this inRP MD.

Technocratic Baron

[R.P.Curator]

Natsu.Kitamura 3

I'd like to put my reward up for grabs. Writing up an inRP report just to get one (1) snub gun is more time and effort than going out to craft it directly.

Mind If I take your reward (kills)?