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Crazy luck of the draw in games
12-13-2009, 02:00 AM
I played a WWII air combat game called check six. The mission was intercepting a squadron of unescorted B-17's. I took my fighter on a head on pass on the
lead B-17 and missed. did an Immehlman diving loop and then fired a burst on the tail end charlie. Only got one hit. On the bomb bay. Which blew up the B-17.
Whose debris caused a whole series of sympathetic detonations to the neighboring B-17's. When the smoke was cleared, 5 out of 7 initial B-17's blew up
and the other 2 had to turn back due to severe damage. Instant ace!
We had a good laugh after the game..especially since it was the first time I played it. Crazy luck of the draw.
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Ah yes, the Lucky BB. It has been the bane of many a man-o-war on the high seas. Well, maybe not 'many' but there's been a few notable occurances,
on both our side and theirs.
BTW: Is the Lucky BB a trope at TV Tropes? Can't really tell right off since the name I'd give to one trope isn't necessarily what everyone else
uses.
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I believe in military circles the concept is known as 'the golden BB'.
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BA, Could Murphy's Bullet be the
trope you're looking for? Or Accidental Aiming Skills? Or Exactly What I Aimed At?
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JS: It's definitely Murphy's Bullet, as it is desirable by the other guys, hella good shot, and hella improbable, too.
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It used to happen all the time back when I played Battletech. Someone would trot out the Assault Mech (usually the Atlas, back in the day) and crow about its
mightiness and power. A round of combat in, someone in an Ostroc (one of the most ludicrous looking mechs in the game) or a Phoenix Hawk would headshot the
Atlas with its heavy laser or an AC/20 and that would be the end of that.
Ebony the Black Dragon
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It's one of the hidden fallacies of the BT franchise. By putting the cockpit in the head, and since the head can only have at most 9 points of armor both
internal and external, just about any weapon can take it out.
And if you've got decent gunnery scores, you can declare a called shot and blow it off with a cannon or lasers. Although my favorite was the SRM/6 pack. I
took out more heads with SRM/6's than with any other weapon.
The video games try to reduce that, which is annoying. I recall in the Mercenaries game, I once nailed an enemy mech in the head with twin PPC's, and all
it did was turn yellow. That should have been a one-shot kill.
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Quote: Ebony wrote:
It used to happen all the time back when I played Battletech. Someone would trot out the Assault Mech (usually the Atlas, back in the day) and crow about its
mightiness and power. A round of combat in, someone in an Ostroc (one of the most ludicrous looking mechs in the game) or a Phoenix Hawk would headshot the
Atlas with its heavy laser or an AC/20 and that would be the end of that.
Did something simular, only it was with the PPC armed variant of the Shadow-hawk. And it wasn't a head hit, it was a Gyro crit.
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I lost my very first 'Mech, a Hunchback, immediately after firing my very first shot, when one of the enemy punched in a crit that blew up my
ammo. Two tons of autocannon ammunition makes a big kaboom.
Edit: On the other hand, I once scored a critical hit -- "Heart pierced, instant death" -- right after my character had told
another that "any barbarian" could hack, but true swordsmanship was in the thrust. If the crit table had declared it a beheading, all the coolness of
the moment would've been lost. I guess the dice were listening to me that day ... for once.
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I once did the exact opposite, DHBirr. I had two SRM carriers hidden in some woods, and ambushed a Clanner assault mech with them. No armor penetration
whatsoever... but I had enough head hits, plus the failed piloting check on the fall, to kill the pilot.
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Speaking of Battletech, does anybody still play? I was looking at MegaMek, and thinking about learning the game.
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Lots of people. Like me. 
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I've been meaning to start... Sometime after this Thursday, though. Class issues.
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This isn't lucky shots so much as luck with an extreme string of resurrections, but I once managed to destroy the Sa-Matra with a single Pkunk Fury.
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Quote: Evil Midnight Lurker wrote:
This isn't lucky shots so much as luck with an extreme string of resurrections, but I once managed to destroy the Sa-Matra with a single Pkunk Fury.
--Sam
"Each day when we awaken we call forth the traditional Spathi prayer: Oh God...Please don't let me die today! Tomorrow would be so much
better!"
You mean there were people who didn't use the Pkunk in that fight? I managed to chain like 10 resurrections together back to back. I never received any
sort of confirmation, but I think getting the resurrection was a matter of timing on the hitting the right key combination when the ship blew up.
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Nope, it's a flat 50% chance.
I haven't played through to the Sa-Matra, but everything I've read says that the Fury is *the* ship for that fight. It's probably my second
favorite ship, after the Thraddash Torch.
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Valles, what are you doing Saturday night?
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Nothing planned at the moment.
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