Badass Space Dragon 2.0 - Round 4 - Cube Farm

games
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Mamma slumped down into his new recliner. It certainly was more comfortable than he had thought it would be on first viewing. The boys had wandered off to Duck’s to see if Browf would let them play with his air hockey table. He could go for some comfy slippers right now, he’d have to talk with Sir Galaxy, see what he’d want for them. Maybe look into a bathrobe, really do it up right. A pipe, perhaps? I mean, really, the end goal was a hat reminiscent of The General’s, would it make more sense to just jump straight to that or would he be hitting out of his range? This seemed like something to build up to. Worth considering both angles right now. It’s not like he’d be stopping off at The Royal Bowler anytime soon. Not with his five 'bits. Well, not even that right now.

Unizone, or not to Unizone. Everyone who went out on that independent art mission seemed like they made out just fine on the other end. Hells bells, he could see Falkayn eyeing up a derby already, slouching into the Inflatable Pub, tossing it casually onto the hat rack. Luckybeard couldn’t even look at the hat rack in that place without envy.

Unizone had possibilities to stay afloat, with their greater resources and loans to fix up the 'haze, but with a five 'bit payout at the end he’d end up worse off than when he showed up here. Well, the grit was something. Couldn’t spend it easily, but it was his. But a miserly five ‘bits. Sticking with Unizone seemed like punishment for signing on in the first place. He’d have to look over his contract with them again. Figure out some options. Either way, this chair was comfy as all get out. Maybe just a short nap. Maybe he’d have that dream about that hat. It’.s… zzzzzz.z…zzzzz

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A Felicitous Greetings to you, Don Mondo.

I have some thing of yours, er, of you, that I attempted to convey to you via your old compatriot Tiny. Alas, Tiny made an infelicitous navigational choice and did not arrive at our parley.

Your eye has been carefully stored in the best cryogenic preservation vault the Polesotechnic league can arrange. I am told your eye is three vaults over from Walt Disney’s head. Please contact me or the Polestotechnic league to arrange proper shipment.

Sincerely Yours,

David Falkayn
Captain, Muddlin’ Through’
Trade Representative, Polesotechnic League.

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Quick Mission Analysis

Assuming repairing 1 HP damage costs b2.0, the average likely payback is:

Mission 1: -b95
Mission 2: b45
MIssion 3: b95
Mission 4: -b10
Mission 5: b0.0

DO NOT TAKE MISSION 1

If you don’t have the money for mission 2, 3, or 4, borrow it from a fellow captain.

Understand you do have choices. Unizone and Ella aren’t the only actors in this galaxy. Captain Gap (@daneel) has already defined Mission 5, as The Color Bomb crew ( @agfish) has been trying to explain .

Also, I want to thank my creditors @uphill and @PromptedInk for the loans that made my last mission possible. I will make full repayment, with interest, when I give my mission orders. I suggest other captains participate in community finance by asking for or making loans to fellow captains. It’s kept me alive.

Enjoy Life. Make Money. Stay Alive

I’ll expand the analysis later today.

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Putting out an open request for a bridging loan of b18. Mutual benefit and interest (b5) guaranteed.

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Community Banking Guidelines

The key to survival this round is for the richer captains to make loans to other worthy captains. Here are the five guidelines I suggest when deciding which loan to make (or take).

Know Your Customer
Don’t risk your ship
The time to call-in a bad loan is before you make it.
Spread Your Risks
Develop a relationship

Know Your Customer. When you make a loan, you are entering a relationship. Make sure this is a person you are comfortable spending some time with.

Don’t risk your ship. You should only loan out funds that can be spared. Your first obligations is to your ship and your crew.

The time to call-in a bad loan is before you make it. No one “owes” anyone financing. If you have a bad feeling about a deal, don’t do the deal. You’ll both be better off.

Spread Your Risks. Life is uncertain. Bad things happen to even the best people and ideas. Especially in Charybdis. Better to enter several small transactions than one big one.

Develop a relationship. If this is just about money, you’re Unizone. Work together. Everyone has something to contribute – be creative. We call this “community banking” for a reason.

Currently, ten captains have a balance of at least b100: myself, Micaela, and these eight fine captains:

@jlw Everest Fullerton
@Slaal Slaal
@davide405 Natasha Fatale
@Old Zaphod Tiberius Skywalker
@PromptedInk Sorbet Wooster
@messana Lazlo ‘Scuttle’ Deepwalke
@greenglyph Dexter Stokastikos
@Demiurgus Null Set “()” O’Connor

Reach out to them by clicking on their @ symbol.

Self-Interested Cooperation is the Basis for All Success

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800px-blue-lobster.jpg800×600 303 KB

[Lazlo thoughtfully grooms an anntenna while considering the plight the Duck’s Pond Gang are facing and chooses his words carefully]

“The Didn’t See That Coming is badly needin’ repairs an’ new equipment, so I’m findin’ myself par-tick-ularly sensitive to the idea of ‘Don’t risk yer ship’ at the moment. But ya gotta ‘nother point there, Falkayn. Might even be worth considerin’ formin’ a proper whaddyacall … combine. A pool of funds, as it were. Spread the risk out even more on any given loan, right?”

“Any given spacer can put funds in the pool, an’ loans would be spread across that pool, payback distributed proportionally. The Compute-O-Tron 9000 is up to the task and the books would be open to all, but from where I’m sittin’, the hard part may be gettin’ spacers to agree on whom to back. Like my grandpappy always said, ‘The only thing I ever seen two spacers agree on is that ya can’t get two spacers to agree on anything.’ But I’m pickin’ up what yer layin’ down there.”

“Now I’d be willin’ to seed that pool with b10. Puttin’ my StarBits where my proverbial mouthparts are, so to speak.”

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27

Mumbling. “I know he can get the job, but can he do the job? I know that Harry. I am not arguing that with you. I am not arguing that with you. I am not arguing that with you.”

Mamma woke with a start. Sweaty brow. Clammy hands. An unpleasant taste in his mouth. The closest that dream had come to a hat was a nightmare scenario where the hatrack kept failing. Unizone was getting too big. Too greedy. Putting its workers behind the 8 ball with no mutual return. 5 ‘bits to get 70 points of damage? This was a bridge too far. For the sake of his crew he’d have to step outside the monopoly and privateer. He just wanted a little respect for his work, not to be treated like a faceless drone decoy. Gotta’ get out of this rat race.

Therefore, I’m asking if anyone is willing to front b40 to help my crew get independent. Willing to discuss any reasonable repayment terms.

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Ella - for Mission 3, what counts as “successful” - undetected return? Or “merely” return with HP > 0" ?

And meaning no disrespect, but do you require equipage at your depot prior to an undertakement of one of your missions?

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@patrace - a purely hypothetical question I am posing for a friend-bee who is rather shy and retiring, if possessed of a mind more devious than mine:

Is it possible to stock up on Unizone parts, declare a Unizone mission, but then wheel about and do some task for Ella, having conducted some back-channel communications prior?

If “possible”, are there negatives involved in this scenario (damage, etc) ?

Idle chit-chat, really, for an, uh, wax-and-style game my friend is conduction. Purely numerical, nothing practical. Cough cough.

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@bizmail_public
Capitain Falkayn…what Mission 5 are you referring to?

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Conduction is your friend…until it isn’t.

But, yeah, I’d be wondering that myself if I had the space bits to make it matter…

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Better to ask for forgiveness than permission. But hell, now your ‘friend’ has somewhat let the cat out of the ‘hypothetical’ bag.

Never ask what you’re allowed to do - all you do is limit options. If it isn’t explicitly stated, JFDI. Even if it is explicitly stated, do it anyway.

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@bizmail_public Captian Falkyn
@micaela
@jlw Everest Fullerton
@Slaal Slaal
@davide405 Natasha Fatale
@Old Zaphod Tiberius Skywalker
@PromptedInk Sorbet Wooster
@messana Lazlo ‘Scuttle’ Deepwalke
@greenglyph Dexter Stokastikos
@Demiurgus Null Set “()” O’Connor

& assorted other alliances:

Gentle-folk, antlered-creatures, fellow captains and carapace-posessors (these categories are not mutually exclusive, although I would be surprised to see all 4 on one personage at once):

You know me from my missions, perhaps we have shared a comradely talk, or the smoke of fellowship.

None of you has yet to call on me for aid, aid that I would not be remiss in yeilding!

Yet it is my time to ask help of you. I find myself in a… situation where I require perhaps a few more StarBits than I currently possesses. I can offer good terms, comfy magnetic boots (although somewhat dusted with pollen, hope you’re not allergic) as collateral, guaranteed repayment*, and perhaps a few kilos of lightly-chewed calming-wax, some immature-grubs that will grow into a loving crew-member, or a few tales for you to tell as your own, with suggestions for modifications and enhancements.

Is there any amongst us who could front b80.0 upon such terms?

I remain, humbly &c,

Savaric Tubertus Wynkn Basiliscos Leontios Palaeologus al Wathiq (Captain).

[L’abeille de la cosmos, c’est moi]

* A space-bee always pays his or her debts.

And who are you, the proud Queen said, 
that I must bow so low? 
Only a bee of a different hive, 
that's all the truth I know. 
In a coat of gold or a coat of black, 
a bee still has a stinger, 
And mine is long and sharp, my Queen, 
as long and sharp as yours. 
And so she spoke, and so she spoke, 
that Queen of Castamere, 
But now the space-rains weep o'er her hive, 
with no one there to hear. 
Yes now the rains weep o'er her hive, 
and not a grub to hear.

To bee honest, I don’t think that ditty has anything to do with debt repayment. But it does have a lovely ring to it, does it not?

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FYI.

The A Certain… Moral Flexibility Would Be The Only Way To Describe It is fitted with a grey market anti-theft device that is unfortunately (for some) not compatible with the Unizone Guidance System.

Any attempt to autopilot this ship unless explicitly authorized by myself will have…consequences.

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Well now, I have heard many epic tales of rugs that were themselves nascent spaceships eons ago, and of rugs whose attraction to hold a room together was unheralded.

I took such a walloping that I am still working to recollect exactly how I came across such rug while careening out of control avoiding the claw rakes and tail whips of that damned scale slouch and it’s crew, but I will take an odd comfort in this accoutrement to my normally spartan flight deck. I am glad that the occasional visitor and deck hands of this fair ship are housebroken and there is no risk of anyone micturating upon this fine specimen.

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Anything is possible.

Captain Jameson, who has probably died of cirrhosis by now,was a master of this.

Put together your mission orders, tell a good story, and see where it goes. Note that mission orders need not be publicly posted here: using private comms to @patrace also works.

As I read thie mission orders, Unizone is only opposing mission 2. They are happy to keep you indebted to them for missions 1,3,4, and 5.

-Falkayn

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That’s… not how I read it:

I would find that [opposing #2 only] particularly bizarre in the case of Mission 3, which is … aggregation of visual data on Unizone activities, to be circumspect.

And Mission 5, if I understand correctly, allows one to sleep in, whilst auto-pilot is engaged and your ship’s shields are pushed through performance-testing.

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1* b25 - Hull Repairs (10 HP)

3* b25 - Four Leaf Clover (2 LK)

1* b40 – Mission 3

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That time has come for me as well. My services are certainly quick and forthright and I have always held my honor high and kept my rack upright at all times not in battle.

In particular, @Slaal Slaal I know we share a common bond in the captainhood of SPEED, and @davide405 - Natasha for our love of all things moose. Any possible arrangement for lloan and repayment or enjoined efforts for profitable missions would be of great welcome. Please join me for tapping my personal cask of honeywine and let us come to a meeting of the minds

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Not…necessarily.

As stated, Mission 1 will be automatically selected. But - as noted, forcing the Moral Flexibility into autopilot will result in its complete destruction, my untimely death and potential collateral damage to other nearby vessels. Maybe other ships are similarly equipped? Perhaps Unizone might not really want to force everyone on it.

Or perhaps your ship might not be available to leave the docking bay?

Or maybe you left on your own exploratory mission and are out of range of Unizone’s remote control systems?

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