Wandering the Wastes 2 - Mr. Burke

2277.08.17 - Day 1 (continued):

I didn't have time to drink my beer before a well dressed man in the corner beckoned my over to speak with him. He introduced himself as Mr. Burke and offered me a job.

Nice hat.

That job was to destroy Megaton, but attaching a remote detonator to the bomb! I though he must be joking at first, but soon realized how serious he was.

I knew that if not me, he'd eventually find someone to do this horrendous act. I told him I'd do it, then immediately went to find Sheriff Simms.

He's the law, right?

I told the Sheriff and showed him the detonator that Burke had given me. Then the Sheriff and I went back to confront Burke.

Time for a reckoning?

Burke didn't want to coorporate at first, but then agreed. As soon as the sheriff had his back turned though, Burke drew on him. I don't know what came over me, but without thinking, I took aim and shot Burke dead.

It was like time had stopped.

 The sheriff thanked me for saving his life. There was other commotion in the tavern, but I was just sort of in a daze. I had killed a man, and the thing that bothered me the most was that I wasn't bothered at all by it.

Goodbye Mr. Burke.

I took Burke's gun and his hat. Sat at the bar, and finished my beer. Less than a day outside the vault and I had learned my past was a lie, killed a man, and saved a life.

Gob, another one.

Wandering the Wastes 1 - Arrival at Megaton

My name is Jasper and I'm searching for a man named James. He left me to die and I want to know why.

My early life was pretty typical I guess--typical for a vault dweller that is. But all that changed one day. I won't get into the details just now. Just know that I was suddenly forced to leave the vault and find my way in a hostile world that I was in no way prepared for.

2277.08.17 - Day 1:
I found myself outside the vault and overlooking the "Capital Wasteland". It was bright, hot, and huge. I had never seen the horizon before, and it took a moment to get use to the sensation that I wasn't surrounded by walls and a ceiling.

This is where it all began.

Down the road a bit I found the remains of a few houses, my Pipboy told me that this was Springvale. I checked the crumbling ruins of what were once typical american homes. It seems that someone had used the one of the mailboxes to stash some weapons. In another house I found a safe. Inside the vault I had taught myself something of the art of picking locks and was able to find even more useful weapons.

Springvale

At the other end of "town" there was some sort of flying robot playing music. It seemed harmless and I was more interested in what it had flown past. I sign for something call "Megaton".

Signs of civilization?

I followed the direction and found a fortress looking structure. Outside was a robot that welcomed me and the guard above waved and the "gates" opened.

What the?

Inside I found a whole town built of scrap and old plane parts. The local sheriff, Lucas Simms, greeted me. This was all a bit overwhelming, but I tried to stay calm. I asked if he had seen James, but he sort of brushed off the question.

Is this what everyone outside dressed like?

I asked a bit more about this town and learned there was a live atomic bomb in the middle of town! I told him that it was crazy to live there, and that someone must disarm it. He said that if I had the skill, he'd make it worth my while to deactivate the bomb.

WHAT!?

 Before I knew what I was saying, I accepted. I didn't know the first thing about disarming a bomb, but well I was gambling that this would get me on the good side of the sheriff and it worked. Asking again about James, he said that he did remember someone coming by and heading up to the saloon.

I told Sheriff Simms that I'd look at the bomb and get back to him. Then after glancing at the thing and not knowing the first thing to do with it, I walked slowly away (avoiding the kooks that were standing around worshiping the damn thing).

There was no time for this. I needed to get some answers, so I headed up to the saloon.

I imagine that there is a lot of drinking in a town build around a bomb.

Inside I met the first ghoul I had even seen. His name was Gob and he seemed like a decent enough guy. Then I met Colin Moriarty. I knew at once that there was something I didn't like about this guy, but he was my key to finding James.

Moriarty told me some things that I found a bit hard to believe at first. I kept my composure and bluffed a him into thinking that I knew more than I actually did. This paid off and I learned where James had gone off to after his short stay in Megaton.

But that didn't seem as important just then. James had lied to me. Everything that I knew about him was build around that lie. Then he left me and nearly got me killed. Now I was stuck, unable to return to my "home" in the vault, surround by strangers and strange things.

I traded a few of the things that I had found in Springvale for a beer. I needed a drink.

A cold one, Gob.

[To be continued...]

What's going on?

Just a quick update. No, I haven't stopped this blog, but I am not sure when I am going to get a chance to post more. There are a few reasons for this:

1) I am busy. I just have had a lot of things that I want to work on, and so I don't have a lot of time and this blog and gaming have both dropped in priority at the moment.

2) I haven't been playing games that are worth blogging about. Really I haven't been playing much of anything for the past week or so.

3) The one game that I am playing, I can't blog about. I won't go into details, but the game I've spend the most time playing and want to log, well... I just didn't get any answer to some questions I had before I wanted to post.

So, I'm sure I'll be adding more soon... but I'm not sure exactly when that will be.

Space Truck'n Episode 13: A New Home

[SPOILER WARNING: Uh... another plot... I promise to take a break from them after this.]

I wanted to get back and start doing some jobs for various faction. I was no fan of the pirates, but being on good terms with them, might mean that I can lower my cost of replacing the satellites that they keep destroying.

But before I could do that I got a message. I had been reviving a request from a Jeff Marxon, for a bit, but I had ignored it. I finally decided to see what he wanted, and it seems that a Xenon CPU ship was flying through Danna's Chance. I jumped in to check it out.

I flew in and saw the ship, but then it jumped away. I was notified that it was now in Freedom's Reach, attacking a station there. The jumpgates were no good, as it had them covered. I would need to use my Unfocused Jumpdrive to get into the sector. Before that, I needed to get a TM ship so I can get the people off the station and out of there. I bought an Argon Magnetar and maxed out it's upgrades.

A ship, that can dock ships!

 After several unfocused jumps to unknown sectors, I finally arrived in Freedom's Reach. I was far outside the area. I transferred to one of my fighters, and had a second follow and protect me. Something destroyed this ship as I drew close. Somehow the CPU ship seemed to be able to initiate a self-destruct. I kept my Magnetar away and flew in close.

Above it all.

 I got close to the station, and picked off a few of the Xenon ships that were attacking it. There were to many for me to take on, so I had to get back to the Magnetar and get those folks out of there.

The Station, Swarm, and CPU.

I got all the survivors on board and jumped out, but I also revived some sort of encrypted message... from the CPU ship. I took the survivors to a safe location. Then, I started to looking into the message. There is a Boron that has made a life study of the Xenon, so I was off to find him and see if he could decrypt the message.

Huh?

 He was last seen in a Boron sector that I hadn't been to before, so it was time to do some travelling. I bought a Pegasus to scout ahead and have the Magnatar jump in when I had found the sector.

It's fast and... well that's enough.

 I found the station, but only learned that he had gone to Aldrin. I jumped in there and started checking with the stations. When I found him, he took a look at the message and said that he would get back to me soon.

Cool shipyard, too bad he wasn't here.

 When he got back to me, he has more info that I had expected. He told me that this CPU ship was trying to contact another. One that had become sentient! This CPU ship had been given a sector away from the known universe in order to live in peace. I would need to jump there and see if this CPU ship could help us.

I hope this is a good idea.

When I found the ship, it did say it would help. It needed me to help get past the firewall of the other CPU ship then it could help it.

Trustworthy?

We jumped to the sector, and then I moved just inside of the max distance in order to make contact and begin breaking down the firewall.

Arg, numbers!

. . . Sudoku?

Once the firewall was down the ship "recovered". It seemed that this ship was on its way to becoming self aware, but that some human had introduced code, the same code that had created the initial Xenon war.

I took him to the Military Outpost in Elena's Fortune. Then a Teladi told me that they would like to thank me for saving them and the station. I was told that I could get my very own sector. I dropped him off, and he was to look into getting the paperwork drawn up.
 

Good luck.

Space Truck'n Episode 12: Treasure Hunt part 4

[SPOILER WARNING: Continuing play on the X3:TC Treasure Hunt quest.]

More clues, more sectors. The next few clues too a bit of study, but at least I wasn't getting ambushed at every turn. Lots of searching and solving the clues. Oh, and another asteroid.

Rock!

I bought and setup another miner to come by and blast the rock, then the search continued.

At last.

Once I solved the last clue, it led me to a Xenon sector. I flew there, but found many Qs right inside the gate. I decided to give the a little chase to move them away from my target. Then jumped back to the gate.

Yikes!

Then I had no trouble finding the ship remains.

Scrap.

Then the "cargo" appeared and tried to bail out. It seemed that "Treasure Hunter" had gotten there. I wasn't about to loose this prize. I opened fired till he bailed out.

Wait... is that...?

I was contacted by the Argon authorities, who wanted me to bring this guy in. They said they would dispatch a ship to pick up the ship.

A bit after dropping him off they contacted me again. They had learned where the crew of the convoy ship are being held. I bought myself a transporter device and took off. Rescue time.

Target.

Beam'm up!

After taking out the ship's escort, I took their shields down and was able to beam the crew over. I decided there was no need to destroy this ship, so once the crew was safely on board, I jumped back to Argon Prime.

As a reward I got the "cargo". A nice piece of history... and not a bad ship either.

The Xperimental Shuttle.

On the way out of the sector, something odd happened. Several Split ships showed up in the sector and started attacking... everything. The Argon responded in kind and I just tried to keep out of the cross fire.

This is bad for business.

Space Truck'n Episode 11: Treasure Hunt part 3

[SPOILER WARNING: The following may contain spoilers for the X3:TC Treasure Hunter quest.]

I was beginning to wonder if this "treasure hunt" was really just some sort of elaborate trap or some sick game. Did this seller want to be found or was I going to keep following these clues to my death?

Hint 4

 The next clue took me awhile. What sector has four suns? How should I know? The Universe map again, held the answer, but it took some. I looked it over once, and couldn't find a sector that fit, so I did a bit of jumping an exploring beyond a few gates that I had not been through yet.

Needs better filters.

Eventually I found the right sector and jumped in. There were several nav beacons spread around, but approaching them caused a bunch of Xenon to jump in. I don't know who this joker thinks he is, but I was not laughing.

After clearing out most of the beacons, I still hadn't found the one that held the clue, and was starting to doubt it even existed. To speed up the search I bought a Disco and had it fly out and start mapping the sector.

Two are better than one.

Still, this was taking too long. Then I saw a Barracuda for sale. I picked it up, repaired the hull, then jumped in to get it outfitted to help with the search.

Boron ships are... interesting.

After getting it fit with shields and some speed upgrades, I transferred over to it and started back my search.

Found you!

I found the beacon I was looking for, and was getting ready to fly back to my Vidar if Xenon appeared, but then something strange happened. I was jumped (or should I say pulled) into another sector! Luckily there was no hostiles around (I had shields but no weapons).

Where am I now?

I got the data storage device and found my way back to my Vidar. Now I was really mad. I wanted to get to this guy now, not for the "treasure" but to punch him in the face.

On the way back I saw another ship for sale, a Buster Raider. I picked it up and repaired it. Even if I didn't use this ship, I could sell it for a gain after the repairs... but I was also considering needing some fighter escorts. Things were getting dangerous and I might need some backup.

Vidar and Buster.

For now I sent my Disco, Barracuda, and Buster to the nearest ship yard. I'd figure out what to do with them later. Now, I had to figure out the next puzzle....

An Anagram...sigh.

Space Truck'n Episode 10: Treasure Hunt part 2

[SPOILER WARNING: Again, I am playing through X3: Terran Conflict's Treasure Hunt plot. I try to keep specifics out, but there may be spoilers.]

2nd Clue

I didn't understand what the second clue was talking about, so I started checking my map. It didn't take too long for me to find the reference, and now I had the numbers I needed. Unfortunately, I forgot the sectors start at 0,0 (not 1,1) and got a bit lost for awhile.

Found you.

Once I got the right sector, I flew around looking for anything out of the ordinary. Soon I found what I needed: another data storage device.

3rd Clue

I took a guess at what sector the third clue was talking about, and jumped in.

I just can't resist blasting Qs.

There was some heavy traffic, so I figured I'd clean things out a bit by blasting away at one of the Xenon Qs that was nearby.

Damn, your buddies are on their way. 

Things would have been fine, but two others showed up and blasted my shields away. I fled, but my hull had taken some heavy damage and slowed me down quite a bit.

Dodging Xenon Q fire.

... and more fire ...

... and still more.

When I got out, my ship was in bad shape. I found a safe spot and started some repairs. It was going to take awhile, but I needed to think of how I was going to handle this situation.

Yeah, I am cheap.

The clue also mentioned "keepers" which might mean the Xenon, or something else. In any case, I wanted something watching my back. I decided to get some fighter drones before I went back in.

Drones away.

When I got back in the sector, I took a hard left and kept moving away from any ships. There was a Kha'ak cluster in the sector now and I didn't want to get in the middle of that and the Xenon. When I got to what I thought was far enough out, I turned right and started scanning. To make sure I was covered, I dropped half of my drones out.

I found a canister in the middle of nowhere, but when I got close it exploded into dozens of drones. I dropped the rest of mine, and then tried to clear them out.

Drone Fight!

 Once they were gone I picked up another data device.

Clue 4

I tried to read the clue there, while my drones calmed down, I wanted to try and pick them back up, but it seemed that a Q had decided to visit. I jumped out leaving my drones to swarm the Q. The next clue will have to wait till I dock and get more drones.

Things are probably going to get worse before this is over.