Part 1: Craig Fights A Tank

PART 2 - Craig Fights A Tank

So, where were we last time? Ah yes, ready for a new mission.



Cool name, good start.



Drunk, Russian, asshole?



You know what? I’m starting to think Olaf’s not the only one with some emotional hangups. These guys clearly have history.



they totally boned



Yes! They were tough. Please, please tell me I get some mech units. Please, Nell. Do this for me.



There’s a footstep behind the infantry units. They turn and see a heavyset man with a lit cigarette in his mouth, his eyes fierce and commanding.

“And who are you supposed to be?” asks one of the Barolds.

“The name’s Craig.” the mech says. “I won’t give you my full name, you ain’t earned that right. I was born on a battlefield. My father was a tank and my mother was a bazooka. I was five when I entered my first battle, and I won. I learnt to drive an APC at eight and became a mercenary fighter throughout my teen years. Fighting was what I was good at, and so I used it to make my fortune. That, in part, has led me here, to you, and to this army. I have no particular interest in the petty conflicts of the Orange Star Army, but you can be damned sure that I’ll fight to the last. There ain’t no unit out there that can kill me and my men. Understand?”

“You are so gonna die first.” mutters a Steve.



Time for a new mission. I’m already itching to try out the mechs!



Man, every time I get a new toy to play with, the enemy get something even better. Is that tanks I see up there? Fantastic. There’s also a lot of buildings around… I wonder what they’re about.





No kidding. This must mean we have Military Santa on the ropes, right?



If they can’t cross the mountains, their drivers just aren’t determined enough, I say.



Might be the best idea, honestly… I’m not excited to battle actual tanks.





The Steve Squadron finds a city. Capturing is a multi-turn process, where each city has a HP of sorts. A unit reduces the city’s HP by however much HP the unit has (so currently 10, since we haven’t taken any damage).



Steve does 10 damage by simply standing on it. What are his shoes made of, osmium?



I had to look up the densest substance on earth for that comment. You’d better appreciate it.



Sweet. So, our units become unusable for a while, but hey, capturing cities is probably a good idea.





Units in the process of capturing shouldn’t be damaged or move off the city, because that’ll revert the capturing process.



Damn. I wanted to see what a tank would be like crushing a city under it’s treads.



Gareth moves out, and now we’ve gotta let the rest of the army catch up. Let’s move!



Everyone’s in position. Besides Craig, who is lagging behind. Dammit, Craig. Either way, it’s now Military Santa’s turn.



Speak of the devil.



Indeed we have! And this time, we have some mechanised infantry!



OK, but “This area is crucial to the defence of the Alara region” and “my most remote units” are very much at odds, wouldn’t you say? Olaf, if this area is as crucial as Nell says, maybe putting eight units in to protect it was your fault entirely.





And not going across the mountains will also be a piece of cake!

By which I mean, I refuse to go across those mountains.



That depends, Olaf. Are they actually going to attack me this time?



The ground troops advance, but the tanks stay where they are.



Very good idea, Nell.





And we own a city! Well done, Steve Squadron. Nice little salute, too.



So I guess you could say Steve reached…

First base?



That explains the blue cities.



Switzerland cities, huh? We’ll have none of that in our Alara region.







Nell continues to inform us about handy city stuff.



You minx! You’re not allowed to intrigue me with what other strange purposes funds can be used fo- it’s for buying units isn’t it.





Truly, a dilemma! Gareth is spoilt for choice here.



This is it, my dude. If I can get this right, I can wow her with my strategic know-how and she might actually start falling for me.



GOD DAMMIT.

In hindsight, I don’t know why I went for the neutral city.





Yeah, I should’ve realised that. My bad.

This does not bode well for my future tactical decisions.



“You’re a tactical disaster area.”



Noted.





“I see absolutely no way that this could go horribly wrong!”

Me neither, Nell.



That’s a game over, if the enemy get your HQ. Of course, capturing the enemy HQ also grants you a victory. I will proceed to forget this fact for about half the map.



Alright! Let’s try not to fuck up horribly, and with that, the map can properly begin!



I need to defeat the upcoming enemies, and to do so I wanna capture the mountain range before they can. Mechs will be better suited for combat, whilst the infantry should focus on capturing buildings.



Which they are doing superbly at the moment. The leftover infantry units are gonna head to the mountains to try and head off the enemy. Come on, Colin!





Olaf moves his troops forward, a little faster than I would like. One of his infantry is already on mountain terrain, which is going to be problematic.



Checking his movement range, however, it seems that he’ll be in range to attack anyone who captures that blue city there. Craig should easily be able to do that, and if that infantry does attack, he won’t be on the mountain terrain anymore.



Unfortunately, that strategy won’t work up here. My infantry are already in range, so I’m just gonna have to gang up on the enemy next turn and hope it works out well.



My three capturing units finish their capturing. I guess we’ve literally painted the towns red!



Craig prepares to lure the enemy.



I move Steve slightly closer to the combat. The 3-space limit for infantry is not a lot, especially for someone used to Fire Emblem’s 5, 6 and even 7 or 8 spaces of movement.



And again, they don’t attack! Good god, Olaf, do you actually want to win or not?!



Craig finishes the capture down south...



...but that does mean Gareth can’t get any closer to the action.

“Hey, Craig, stop blocking me, man!”

“Ain’t my fault you can only move two spaces.”

“YOU CAN ONLY MOVE TWO SPACES AS WELL CRAIG, YOU AREN’T SPECIAL”



I can fire on this infantry from the safety of the mountains myself, so I may as well.



It’s not a particularly interesting battle, with both sides doing squat damage.





Barold gets his pick of the litter here, but the counter damage won’t be fun.



I eventually park Barold on a base without attacking. At least he’ll heal some of the damage he takes.

If the enemies even attack me.



Time to kill this infantry. Actually, thinking about it…



If I attack from down here instead with Colin, the space above the enemy is free for Dave to take the kill.



Now that's strategy!



But wait, the plan gets even more exciting.



I wonder if Olaf’s men are pacifists? That’d explain why they don’t attack on their turns.



Aha! I planned this and everything! Gareth is free to open fire on the mech.

no, I promise you, I did plan this

I’m a good strategist





It’s an even trade-off. Looks like that mountain defence really is helping Olaf’s men out. Still, we did a bit of damage, and that’s a good thing. Olaf’s turn next.



And it is at this moment that I realise why his men aren’t attacking - they’re making a beeline for my HQ! Battle stations, everyone - destroy those units at all cost!

Thinking about it, yelling “battle stations” is probably unnecessary. We’re already on a battlefield, I can probably assume that everyone’s ready for battle. Though, if this is anything like Fire Emblem, they’re probably reading books and sorting out their relationship issues.





The Gareth Group are looking a bit under the weather at this point. Mechs are no joke.





I focus my fire on the infantry next to the mech for the time being. There’s just one lone gunman left!





And just one guy left again. Also, don’t stand in the street, you guys! You might get run over. By a tank or something. Or that car-looking thing in the background there.



There’s no overkill like doing more damage to an enemy than you have to.



Because. Uh. That’s the definition of overkill.



Hey, what’s this? A free space for a unit to destroy that mech? Yes please.





Your bullet transaction has been completed. Thanks for shopping with Death Co.





Since I had that mech dealt with, I can use my own mech to attack the other enemy mech.

Mech mech mech. Meh.



Olaf’s turn. But he’s running out of units and is at quite the disadvantage now.



WHY

Ugh, forget it. Apparently units just don’t attack people in this game.



I want to lure these tanks and see just how powerful they are, so I move my mech - an infantry should be more than enough to take care of that weakened mech.





And I was right. I am an excellent strategist!



I mean, just look at this perfect formation. My strategic skills know no-



Was that the tank from across the bridge? But it was miles away! How much range do these things have?



Not only do they hit like, well, a tank, but they also took absolutely no retaliation damage.



Oh god. I regret everything.



Not a scratch. These tanks are powerful - Olaf was right. I’m sorry for doubting you, Olaf.





I’m also sorry in general. Even the Craig Contingent take heavy damage.



...But Craig wasn’t bullshitting about his prowess earlier! He and his men land a solid hit on the tanks, proving that they can in fact be damaged!



Well, fuck. That was a rough turn - even though the mechs can do damage to the tanks, it still isn’t a lot of damage and they take a ton in retaliation. Both of them are damaged, too, so it’s not going to be a reliable strategy. What to do, what to do…



Retreat! Retreat!



Except you. Shoot that tank.



That… was a bad idea, wasn’t it.

Poor Craig.



Olaf’s turn. The tanks are unable to get past the mountains as expected, which means that everyone is safe! Everyone besides…



“Gah!” yells Craig, falling back with his bazooka clutched in his hand. “Looks like… I’m not coming back this time… sorry, mother…”

One of the Daves stares at Craig with mounting horror. “No, Craig, no!”

“It’s fine…” Craig whispers, struggling to speak. “Just… destroy this Olaf bastard for me, alright, Dave?”

“I will.” Dave says. “I promise you.”

Craig’s eyes close, and his breathing slows. He opens one eye and looks directly at the Dave. “I think this army earned my respect when you went toe-to-toe with tanks. My full name… is Craigsworth…”

The Daves can’t help but burst into laughter. “Fucking Craigsworth?! Holy shit, that’s incredible. Ahahahah!”

“Fuck… you… guys…”

And with that, Craig and his mercenary band are slain.



No point even trying to fight these guys. 4% is absolutely nothing.



I simply have everyone retreat to safety whilst I desperately try to think of a plan.

And then it occurs to the Daves that there might be a way to attain victory.



The Dave Division moves out.



After a few turns of Daves walking to places, I get bored. Gareth’s Group has healed up on the base for a few turns, so I decide to take my boredom out on this tank.



It goes amazingly well.





Olaf’s turn rolls around, but he doesn’t inflict much damage. We might be able to kill this tank!



Dave, meanwhile, reaches the enemy HQ, and none of the tanks can reach him!



Looks like we… capt a bitch.





That is great, but I do feel bad. Craig died for nothing, really, and I could’ve done that map way quicker had I realised earlier that I didn’t need to fight the tanks at all.



she’s finally gonna confess her love

come on

come onnnn





...Sigh. No need to look so happy about it, Nell. What happens to the funds? Do you just put them into your own pocket? I bet you do.

I mean, those garish violet uniforms you wear can’t come cheap.



Olaf is understandably irked that his tanks were in, strategically, the worst possible location on this map.





He then appears to suffer a brief bout of amnesia and cannot fathom what just happened.

I believe the kids call it “getting owned”, Olaf. That is what’s going on.



They were doing their best, to be fair, in the face of an uncaring mountain range that they could not pass through.



Damn. Looks like we finally annoyed him enough to pay proper attention to these PIVOTAL BATTLES FOR CRUCIAL TERRITORY CONTROL.



This guy just cannot catch a break. Maybe next time, he’ll actually attack us, like, every turn. It’s a crazy proposition, I know, but it might just help him win.



Yes! The name works perfectly this time around. Thank you very much, Nell!



Another A Rank, but my technique and speed have dropped - mostly for losing Craig and then having Dave spend about 7 days walking across the map.



Next time - we join! Whatever that means. Now that we’re done here, though, I’m gonna go mourn Craig for a bit. An easily-avoidable death like that just makes me sad.

That said, if anyone wants to suggest names for my new units, feel free to let me know. You've seen how the names work, so, uh, go nuts.