Mountain Raid

Dennis sucks more than the Packers did. I even overtrained him, teaching him Zoom II along the way, and he still misses at point blank. Worst sniper than when I played Sniper Elite. But before that...

Our team plans their attack on the mountain base of Taal Base. It's a natural defensive position as it was built into a mountain. But there are a few ways in. We can storm the front gate or enter through the top. This decision will vastly alter the game going forward, but I'll get to that later. I choose the front gate because I know there's a "monster" guarding it. Purple Haze runs as a third distraction, with the encroaching rebels being the primary. Team Emma and Purple Haze are launched out of the submarine like missiles, and we land perfectly in the middle of the base. Ryoji stumbles, so not all of us. Cindy and Ryoji have a fun little flirty conversation before we part ways.

Battle one is deceptively easy. It's a few tanks, two people, a wanzer, and a massive mech that takes up four squares. It looks like a space shuttle loading dock, so it's kinda cool. Despite the new threat, this is an easy battle because our submarine provides artillery fire between turns. It drops a salvo in a nine square area, doing decent damage. I targeted the monster and anyone else nearby every turn. We'll blast our way into the base from the hangar monster came out of. Kazuki is nearly lost in the fire because he's too eager to get in. He says nearly dying calmed him down, but I have my doubts.

Ar various points tonight, we'll cut to the base commander planning their counterattack. He'll trick a well known rebel by the name of Jose into fighting for his enemy. If he stops us, he'll go free.

The next fight has stage hazards. Watch out for the munition deposits, as they'll explode when struck. This does damage to everyone around them.

Battle three can be a wreck, and it's here where I started losing faith in ol' Dennis. We're against three wanzers, two aerial gun batteries, and a new special mech. One of the wanzers will stay back until you get too close, so let the others approach. The gun batteries have high evasion for some reason, and even Emma missed a shot. Dennis had a decent chance on them, but he missed every time. Even Zoom II didn't help. It caused us to take far more damage than we needed to, and Kazuki nearly died. I had to use two repair kits and a part reviver. Even then, he was down to punching at the end. Oddly enough, I didn't have any problems with the massive guy. He can only attack every other turn, and the laser doesn't even do that much damage. After the fight (or before), one of the Purple Haze guys, Lukav, catches up to us. Jose is wreaking shop of the group. Lukov's wanzer has lost an arm and won't last much longer. And the rebels are nearly here, so we need to hurry up!

Emma and Kazuki head into the next room on foot. It's where the scientists are held, and Alisa is with them. After Kazuki finally gets reprieve, the topic of Midas is brought up. Alisa is able to understand how it works, and she knows whoever built it sucks. This causes a fight between Alisa and Emma, but Emma backs down because our sister is correct. Midas is in the process of being moved, and we need to flee anyway. There's a way out via the port.

Battle four can go either way. We're joined by four useless people not in wanzers. They stand around, try to get in the way, and tank shots for us. The nameless scientists don't mean anything, but we need to keep Alisa and Lukov alive. Lukov suggests we flee without him, but Kazuki is finally turning into a hero and refuses to leave him. Take out the wanzers and tanks. On round five, we'll get some bad news from Purple Haze. Jose is winning. The scientists, Alisa, and Lukov board a ship to get to USN Fleet, and the party heads to help Purple Haze. Lukov asks why Kazuki didn't just abandon him, and we respond with, "because we're allies." Lukov says Kazuki is too soft.

Jose is standing over the ruined mech of Gastor from Purple Haze. Cindy and Joe are all that remain, but Cindy can't move. Joe is ready for another attack, but Jose is too strong. He apologizes as he kills Joe. We arrive just in time to see Cindy shot down. Ryoji becomes enraged and vows revenge.

This was not a fun battle. We're against two monsters, one helicopter, three wanzers, and Jose Estrada. Jose rushed us and died in two turns. He was glad to finally stop fighting. Those two rounds left us in a rough position, though. We're in range of monster fire, and the other three wanzers have us surrounded. And Dennis keeps missing! Seriously, screw Dennis. He's fired. Unfortunately, I had to rely on him. Kazuki and Ryoji got taken down, and Emma had her attack arm blown off. I had to save scum the hell out of this, but once I got down to the two monsters, Dennis used his range and managed to take both of them out. He decided to take out the legs first every time, but his final mission was a success.

We saw Midas loaded into a seaplane before the battle, so Emma and Kazuki go after it now while the others return to the fleet. They manage to catch up, and Enma promises to bring it down. She does nothing to do so... We cut to a beautifully rendered scene where the seaplane flies over the rebel naval fleet. Midas is dropped, and all hell breaks loose. A brilliantly bright light forms under the sea, and it functions like a laser cutter at first. The ships are cut into pieces, and even the plane is taken out. The lasers grow until they form a ball of light that even evaporates the water. This is the power of Midas. Midas was launched, Purple Haze is dead, but at least we have Alisa... We'll figure out what to do tomorrow.