FIREBASE ALPHA: FLANNI

Private First Class Flannigan was pissed. Flanni, as everyone knew him, was bored. When his team was offered the chance to go with some rebels and attack a TU'COn installation he refused with a laugh. The mission was supposed to come first. The mission. Not a stupid quest.

The game plan that Flanni and Team PepMotion president Zzz came up with for this stage of the competition was to get through the scenario as quickly as possible with no casualties.

Now that he and his three squad mates had finished the mission there was nothing to do. As soon as they arrive the restocked ammo. Easy peasy.

Next off to the medics. Jenfle had a minor wound treated. She was fine, just a flesh wound, -2hp. Still, being at full health was important. Jenfle healed, it was skills time.

Based on what they did and how many XP each player received, their were promotions and leveling up and skills.

In the military branches, promotions were levels. There were no level 27 soldiers. There were Staff Sargent second class or even 4th Lieutenant . After buck sergeant, all of the ranks had additional "classes" to them. Most people just said level, like Staff Sergeant Level 2.

Civilians got levels, like Scout Level 3 or Technician Level 87. Dual classes were allowed, you could be a Private First Class and an Explorer Level 2. Flanni had once run across some jackwiz who was first level in a dozen classes. The guy explained he had a hard time with commitment. Flanni made a joke about never getting married. The guy didn’t find it funny.

After promotions or levels or whatever the hell they were called, came skill upgrades. Skills were things you could do and how well you could do them. A Technician Level 87 was useless if he didn’t have any repair or maintenance or even operational skills.

Sometimes you got skills by doing stuff. If you shot people, or TU'COns or giant man eating cats, your rifleman skill might go up. Perform first aid and you might get medic skill.

After a promotion, you were given a free skill of your choice. Some restrictions apply.

If you had gobs of money you could sometimes buy a particular skill, but that wasn't allowed for these contestants.

You could also go to school. If you went to a skill school it only cost a little bit of money, but a whole lot of time.

Time was what Flanni had, but not that much time and there were no schools here. Flanni just had time be bored and pissed. Other teams were out there playing. Out there gathering experience and skills and getting loot.

How did that idiot DeBark from team Mountain Punks, or Mountain Men, or whatever become a marksman now? That shlub Lizzytastic from Team Poweder Puff G’s was a sergeant? This is all wrong! As a squad leader, so Flann started as a Private First Class, but still, you needed good experience to get the promo to Lance Corporal or even Sergeant.

Flanni kicked a rock and sent it skittering. Their rush through the scenario had gotten. Him a promo to Lance Corporal, rifleman level 2, marksman level 1 and recon level 1. With the promotion he increased Marksman to level 2. Not for the first time he wished he could play his old character. GengiCan would kick ass. Marksman level 48, energy weapons 62. Not much point in pissing about it. At least I’m getting paid to start a new character for this.

Naturally his old team had all made new characters. Jenfle used to have a kick ass hot shot piloting and space combat character. No, after flying the shuttle, she got piloting level 2. With here promo to Private First Class, she chose Medic 1. I thought sure she would take heavy weapons. It’s just wrong to see her with a medic armband and a carbine instead of a heavy laser. At least if we ever need a medic...

The last two members of the team got Rifleman 1. Just Rifleman 1. Military branches players normally started with Rifleman 1 after basic training. There just weren’t enough baddies to shoot, not enough challenges to get skills from. Running point, Flanni had zapped the baddies and solved the problems. Now his team was pissed at the lack of XP,a dn levels and skills. Now they were just getting drunk.

Soon Flanni would have to intervene. If they got called on a mission, he couldn't have drunk teammates. What skills they had to be degraded. It would feel like their thoughts were slow and fuzzy. Bad effects in combat.

None of the "officers" on base would tell any of the players what was going on. They kept saying "orders will be forthcoming." Dozeman, commander of Team Too Cool learned that raising your voice to one of the officers was a great way to lose a stripe. If you kept yelling you got to visit the guardhouse. Everybody learned the lesson as NPC MPs dragged Dozeman away.

He walked towards the NCO club where his soldiers were drinking. It was time for them to stop. Or time for him to start. Lance Corporal Flannigan was pissed.