THE SAZZARRAN EMPIRE Pt 3

This blog will show the timeline between the Sazzarran Empire and Earth in the Sol system, and how they eventually meet. So sit back, have some popcorn, some home brew, or whatever suits your palate, as I entertain you with the future history of Earth and its first interstellar war with a reptilian species called the Sazzarran Empire.

During Earth year 2063, Sarriss Azzarro was born on Sazzarr to military parents. At the same time on Earth, humanity was near the brink of a third world war. Oil was getting sparce in some countries, and others were loathe to export it fairly. The food industry also had to change as the only good place to plant and grow any crops were in Canada, Northern United States, and North Eastern Europe. The poorer nations were forced to use reconstituted food products, while the wealthier nations tried to provide as much support to the poor nations as possible, while still maintaining their own hierarchy of self importance.

Like most children born to military families, Sarriss had a rough life. It would toughen him up for when he started actual military training at the age of 13 (about 16 in human years).

During Earth year 2074, some nations had started sending spacehips to Mars in an effort to colonize and terraform it. During Earth year 2080, Sarriss Azzarro was already an eager young officer in the Sazzarran Army.  It was also the year World War III began.

During 2083, Sarriss was the equivalent of a company commander, leading 100+ Drathkoni soldiers against a revolt on a colony world. In fact, it was one of the colony worlds the Sazzarran had occupied and defended against from the Djoreli and their allies almost 200 years earlier. Sarriss' company was able to stabilize the revolt (eliminate their leaders), and bring status quo back to the colony.  He was praised by his superiors and soon promoted to second in command of battalion of several hundred troops.

At the same time on Earth, the poor nations were suffering badly from the the war. The more affluent nations were still functioning, but the utilization of tactical nukes in some regions had severely limited their manufacturing facilities. Mars had a small colony setup with about 30 personnel, and was beginning another colony to investigate the possibility of mining any resources.

During 2087, the Third World War ended hostilities. The nations were at the breaking point. Their resources limited due to the destruction of key cities, and various production facilities. Countries like Canada, and Northern Russia, as well as parts of China, and the US state of Alaska were the only places that could still harvest food naturally. The nations of Earth knew human life was going to die if they did not do something soon to bring it back from the brink of extinction.

The first thing they had to do was reconcile differences between each other. They needed to share the wealth, so to speak. The United Nations was re-created with a new forum to protect the Earth and its environs at all costs, whether domestic, internationally and even from beyond Earth. There had to be life out there in the universe, and eventually Earth would be found. So they had to prepare for the worst.

While Earth regained its footing, the Sazzarran Empire was ever expanding. By 2095, Battlelord Azzarro was becoming popular in military society and sometimes the center of attention in the political parties. He started hearing reports from the scout ships of worlds with massive creatures, some of them semi-intelligent. In the last 1,000 years, they had only encountered a dozen worlds containing massive land and sea creatures. There was even a spacefarer's story of giant flying space lizards that fed on solar radiation and gases from gas giants.

Battlelord Azzaro would use this data to influence some of the politicians, and his military superiors, to begin research on capturing some of these massive creatures to use as weapons of war. Frontline assault beasts. It took him months to get all the data he needed before introducing it to the right people. Eventually, it paid off and within a year he was given a substantial amount of funding to find these creatures, investigate and research their potential.

By 2096, Battlelord Azzarro had his own special fleet assigned, and designed, to capture any massive creature that was worth researching. By 2100, Azzarro's fleet had captured three creatures, a giant four armed simian, a massive lizard on a volcanic world that spewed gases, and a near intelligent and aggressive four legged centaur-like species. This last specimen was not massive, but there were experiments being conducted to expand the cells of living organisms that would increase their size significantly. These centaur species would be the first test subjects.

By 2105, Earth was healing. New science was developed to grow better and more abundant crops that could help feed all nations for a long time. The Earth's oceans were cleaned of as much garbage as could be found, and sent by rockets into space towards the sun. The fish population was starting to expand again. But this time there were more restrictions on what was allowed to be caught and how much.

The United Nations created a new military organization called the UERF, United Earth Reaction Force. This organization would have its own army, air force, navy, and marine contingents. People from all nations could join and did, eventually forming an military organization bigger than any individual nation on Earth. With the new military came new equipment such as powered suits and 5 metre tall bipedal walkers called BAV's (Bipedal Assault Vehicle). The Navy started working on a hover jet system for some of their ships. In particular, the carriers. The idea was to allow them to circumvent stormy weather and gain better speed and distance across the oceans.

By 2108 there were three colonies on Mars, each with a population of 50 to 100 people. One of the colonies was a mining facility where they could process what little ores Mars interior possessed. During this time, Battlelord Azzarro had captured seven species of creature, varying in size from 30 metres to 600 metres. The largest being a sea dwelling creature with the head of a dragon, multiple tentacles, and the ability to create ballast bubbles all over its body. The creatures were called stinzoa (roughly translated as giants) The Sazzarran scientists were ecstatic about these stinzoa. They practically worked night and day to provide positive results that would enable Azzarro to use the massive beasts in a combat situation.

By 2110, Azzarro had his scout ships searching for likely inhabited worlds to use his war beasts. Some small populated worlds were found. Some of the stinzoa were used, such as the centaurs that were now 40 metres tall, wielding a vicious double-bladed vibro axe and had several long whip tails with barbed points. The centaur stinzo proved themselves quite well in combat. They also had an appetite for eating their enemy. Azzarro would watch out for that. It gave him the idea to have some kind of control measure on these stinzoa. So he had his scientists implant cybernetic eyes, and sensors into the beasts. He would also have personnel trained to "control" the stinzoa in combat. They would be the eyes and ears.

By 2112, one of Battlelord Azzarro's scout ships happened upon a research world occupied by the Wadoran. The Wadoran were an inquisitive species who loved to experiment. It seemed this time they were experimenting with matter transmission. Azzarro sent his fleet to the world. It was easy taking out the small squadron of ships assigned to protect the world. It was easier capturing the Wadoran scientists and their matter transmitter equipment and taking it back with them to Azzarro's own research world. The capture of this equipment and Azzarro's research into the stinzoa received a lot of attention back on Sazzarr. So much that they invited him back there to promote him to Warlord status.

By 2114, the Sazzarran scout ships found a perfect system for Warlord Azzarro to use all his stinzoa. It was considered a "protected" world by the Wadoran. It had already developed intra-system space travel between two worlds. One of those worlds was slowly being terraformed and had a few hundred people on it. The other world, their homeworld, was temperate with land masses and plenty of ocean. It also had several billion people. That world was simply called "Earth" by its inhabitants.

During 2114, Warlord Azzarro had a massive fleet of several thousand combat and troop transport ships at his disposal. He also had a few massive matter transmitter arrays developed by his loyal scientists that could send large bodies of personnel, or even stinzoa, short line of sight distances between two worlds within a star system.

Earth would become his testing ground for the matter transmitter, his stinzoa, and his invasion force. It would take him two years to plan the imvasion with a few weeks of travel to the Sol system. It was well outside the Sazzarran border, but he did not care. His superiors wanted results, and he would deliver.

THE SAZZARRAN EMPIRE Part 2

After 500 years of exploration and conquest, the Sazzarran finally found an equal. The Djoreli Imperium. The fight between them caused other species to rally to both sides, creating the First Galactic War.

The war lasted nearly 30 years, with all species taking massive casualties and collateral damage to their colonies, and even some to their homeworlds. It only ended because the Sazzarrran were starting to lose more soldiers than they could train. They decided to call a truce, and withdraw back to their own corner of the galaxy, yet still managing to control several hundred worlds.

It took the Sazzarran Empire another 200 years before they tried another galactic wide conflict. During that time they built up their planetary defenses on major worlds, and setup well armed and armoured garrisons on all the other minor worlds in their sphere of influence. They also improved on space travel and were able to shift between worlds on well traveled space lanes in a matter of days instead of weeks. They were nearly at the level of the Djoreli in technological advancement.

This time, they used the assistance of the Gorakan Enclave, an alliance of space pirates, to perform raiding parties against common shipping lanes. Specifically, any shipping belonging to any allied worlds to the Djoreli Imperium.

As the Gorakan conducted their usual raids to keep up appearances, the Sazzarran and their closest ally, the Ja'kel, sent out scouting parties of their own to observe enemy colonies on their borders. Once they had enough information on the colonies, they attacked all of them at once. Fifty colonies were wiped out within hours. Another 200 were subjugated within days.

It took the Djoreli a few weeks to get the reports of raids against allied colonies. They sent out scouts to observe the activity and make contact with any survivors. By the time the scouts reported back, another 80 colony worlds were being attacked.

The Djoreli sent out a call to arms to their allies, the Irappa, Wadoran, Troell, and a few other less equipped species. Their fleets were massive, each numbering in the hundreds, as they moved towards the Sazzarran and Ja'kel borders. The Sazzarran and Ja'kel were waiting for them with their own fleets, also numbering several hundred each, and spread across 10,000 light years of space.

As the allied fleets advanced, they sent out Irappan anti-pirate patrols along the shipping routes to thwart the Gorakan raids. Eventually, they were able to protect the cargo ships to their destinations. The Gorakan just moved to other space lanes to harass other cargo ships. It was a game of cat and mouse between the Gorakan pirates and the Irappan patrols.

Meanwhile, the Sazzarran had set up magnetic space mines all around their subjugated worlds. If the Djoreli wanted their allied worlds back they would have to suffer a lot of casualties in getting through. The Djoreli were well versed in military warfare in space and on the ground. They had been exploring space and fighting various species for several hundred years before they met the Sazzarran. However, they knew the reptilian Sazzarran and their canine cousins, the Ja'kel, would bring a vicious fight. They were definitely the best adversaries the Djoreli had faced.

Over a period of weeks, the allied forces bashed into and sometimes through the Sazzarran/Ja'kel defenses, firing plasma torpedoes at the array of magnetic mines orbiting the colony worlds in order to clear a path for the dropships. For some worlds, this method worked, and the allied forces were able to set foot on those colonies, only to find the colonies were obliterated,  or were well defended. It was a brutal battle on all fronts, on the ground and in space.

Weeks turned into months, as both sides were reinforced with food, fresh ships, weapons and various equipment. The Sazzarran and Ja'kel were well prepared for this conflict, which would be known as the Second Galactic War.

As the Sazzarran were busy defending their occupied worlds, and keeping the allied forces concentrating on them, the Ja'kel had taken a large fleet thousands of light years away and then back towards the home worlds of the minor allied species, who were less militarized. The intent was to do as much damage to key facilities that would debilitate the allied forces.

By the time the allied forces were told of the sneak attacks on their worlds, some of them broke ranks in the fleets to shift back as quickly as possible to protect what remained. This left the allied fleets a little weaker, which gave the Sazzarran the opportunity to send some skirmish fleets of their own. By the time those fleets arrived at their home worlds and major colony worlds, they saw mass destruction to their shipping yards and mining facilities. The Ja'kel had disappeared to their next target. Eventually, the Ja'kel fleet made its way back to the main battle front,

It was a vicious ship to ship battle, as the Sazzarran managed to penetrate a few of the capital ships with their boarding shuttles, and either take over an allied ship, or scuttle it if it was too damaged. the allied forces were not sitting down, eating popcorn while this was going on either. The ursine Troell were always keen for combat, and were prepared when Sazzarran troops tried to enter their ships. The Sazzarran never had a chance. The Troell cut them down with scything laser beams, plasma axes and sheer willpower.

There was victory and defeat on both sides for the next two years. The Sazzarran would not give up the worlds they had taken without a good fight. They got it in spades, as the allied forces continued to push through to as many worlds as possible. A number of them they had to abandon as they were key worlds with valuable resources and well protected by the Sazzarran and Ja'kel forces.

After four years of raids on their own worlds, as well as trying to regain their worlds at the main battle front, the allied forces badly needed some rest, refit and repair. They called for an armistice. The end result of the Second Galactic War was the Sazzarran managed to maintain control of nearly 100 worlds, while the Ja'kel claimed another 40 for their own. Of the remaining 200 worlds that were involved in the war, 36 of them were wastelands, 90 were no longer populated, and 74 were salvageable with an infrastructure and a sparse population of colonists.

The Sazzarran, although having lost almost half of their fleet and ground forces, were still going strong defending their occupied worlds. They would rebuild those worlds, and continue to expand further into the corners of the galaxy not yet explored. One such route would eventually take them to a blue marble of a world in a yellow star system.

THE SAZZARRAN EMPIRE

In this next few blogs, I will introduce the Sazzarran Empire, how it began, and the point when they invaded Earth.

Warlord Azzarro standing on the head of a kaiju

The Sazzarran Empire was not always a united entity. Many millenia ago, it was divided into three factions on its homeworld. Zzarr, a temperate world with only about 35% water mass. All three factions were reptilian in nature, measured between 2.5 to 3 metres in height or length, and had a range of blue, gray, green or brown colours.

The sea dwellers, known as vassixx, mostly have blue and green skin. At first, they just lived in colonies in the sea caves. Centuries later, they had met the ground dwellers, the drathkoni, and were introduced to building cities under water. 

The vassixx appreciated the help the drathkoni offered, but soon realized the drathkoni also wanted to take advantage of the resources in the oceans, which was starting to prove harmful to their colonies. 

Using the technology the drathkoni had taught them, the vassixx were able to create their own weapons and armour that would allow them to fight against the drathkoni to protect their oceans and the colonies within. The war began with the vassixx taking the most casualties. They could only go so far on land before they needed water to survive. They created a special breathing apparatus, but if it was compromised, they were in danger of dying from lack of fluid. The drathkoni did not fare any better when fighting under water. Although they had one-person to multi-person submersible craft, the vassixx had the upper hand and once they penetrated the vessels, the drathoni only had their water suits to protect them until those were also penetrated.

After several years of fighting, both races were finally able to come to an agreement. The drathkoni would trade resources with the vassixx.

The air dwellers, known as the sorrazha, are a brown and gray-skinned gargoyle-like race that originally lived in caves in the mountain regions. Drathkoni geologists found a colony of the sorrazha when they were looking for mineral deposits for mining.

The sorrazha did not take kindly to being forced out of their homes, so they retaliated by swarming down on the drathkoni miners, and soldiers providing security for the miners. Both sides took casualties that resulted in the drathkoni hunting down any sorrazha colonies and enslaving them. The sorrazha just went higher into the mountains but the drathkoni were ecventually able to track them to their new lairs.

In one particular mountain, known as the Peak of Despair by the drathkoni, the sorrazha had laid a trap for any drathkoni that entered the caves. The drathkoni lost thousands of soldiers. They tried to burn the sorrrazha out of the caves. The sorrazha had other cave opening they used as egress routes, which allowed them to escape the burning death.

This went on for a few years, with the drathkoni building mines in the mountain and hilly regions, meanwhile forcing the sorrazha to find new homes. Eventually, the sorrazha were met by drathkoni scientists on an expedition to find and research the sorrazha culture. At first the sorrazha were skeptical and would not have anything to do with a drathkoni. It took months, but the drathkoni scientists were proven to be friendly and trustworthy enough to allow into the sorrazha colony.

As the scientists learned more about the sorrazha and reported any findings to their chain of command, they also taught the sorrazha parts of their own culture and technology. The sorrazha found that the drathkoni needed to mine valuable resources in the mountains in order to expand beyond this world. The sorrazha, although curious about such a venture, just wanted to be left alone. The drathkoni government would not stop until they could mine everything they could find under the surface of their world. It was decided by the drathkoni high council that the sorrazha were to be given sky cities to inhabit. This way, they could create the cities as they wished, would not be hunted, and it would allow the drathoni to mine to their hearts content.

There was one exception that if there were any mountains that had no resources to mine the sorrazha would also be allowed to inhabit them. It was agreed, and in several years, the sorrazha had their first sky city hovering on massive grav assisted engines kilometres above the Zzarran surface.

The ground dwellers, known as drathkoni, have green to brown skin. Not unlike we humans of Earth, they evolved to develop an organized colony, and started to learn more about building better housing, better weapons to hunt, and creating a justice system against crime.

Thousands of years later, the drathkoni were as civilized as humanity is in the 21st century. The drathkoni had explored all of their world, and during that time had met the sea dwelling vassix and air dwelling sorrazha, and were found to be the most aggressive and most numerous of the three races.

Sazzarran homeworld

The dratkoni government had expanded and became a worldwide organization, uniting all three intelligent races, and calling themselves Sazzarr, meaning one world. But not before they had mines set up in key spots around their world to refine the best resources they could for creating better vessels that could take them off of this world, and to colonize other worlds nearby. Of course they had a massive military force created for all three races that would train and work well with another in preparation for other world domination, or colonization, as they like to call it.

The drathkoni would be the ground force. The sorrazha the air force, and the vassix the sea faring forces. They each had armour, weapons and equipment best suited to their elements. It took another two hundred years before they could start expanding to the nearby inhabited systems. At first they sent probes, then small scout ships to study, then colony and warships to "colonize".

Within 500 years, the Sazzarr had occupied and terraformed at least 100 worlds. They now called themselves the Sazzarran Empire. Within 1000 years, they had over 600 worlds. They were nearly unstoppable, until they met the Djoreli.

THE BATTLEMASTER Pt 3

WARNING: Some of the material described in this blog may be too graphic for some readers.

The disaster at Orrim resulted in the colony survivors being relocated to another inhabitable part of the world. There was a memorium for Battle Major Sewik-Rando, then it was back to business on the MECHA.

The MRD needed to reinforce the armoured chest plating. They had the best materials that could be found. So the next solution was to create a force shield for the MECHA. Normally, the force shield would lose power as it was hit, until it had no power output remaining. However, with energy being supplied through the fusion reactor in the MECHA, the force shield could be re-energized to its full output on a continual basis, until such time as the reactor was damaged. The pilot still had to manage power to the mobility of the MECHA, as well as any energy weapons utilizing power from the fusion reactor, so this could still limit the energy supplied to the force shield.

After a few more test runs piloted by Colonel Nogel, the MECHA was ready for combat again. This MECHA was labeled as XPM-02. This time, Colonel Nogel fought against another "Brawler" and a "Ravager", a 30 metre tall four armed simian creature. The Djoreli started calling these giant creatures djaikrozito (jai kro zee to) or war titans.

The Ravager was easy. It seemed to have a tough hide, and was vicious in close combat, but once it was hit by HEAP (High Explosive Armour Piercing) missiles, that was pretty much the end of it. As for the Brawler, Colonel Nogel had his hands and mind full with this one, as it just would not stop charging into his MECHA.

It was much tougher than the Ravager, and almost faster with its four massively muscled legs. It still had the barbed tails, but this one was holding a slug throwing weapon in one hand and the massive axe in the other. It seemed to be ambidexterous. The projectiles from the slug thrower were armour piercing (AP) tipped, and could have penetrated the armour of the MECHA if it was not for the force shield.

Colonel Nogel unloaded all 24 missiles from long range at the Brawler. It took almost half the hits, but still pushed on towards him. He then fired his plasma rifle at medium range. Some of the energy blasts managed to strike and burn the Brawler's hide as it charged onward, although a little slower as its injuries were starting to take effect.

As the Brawler charged forward it was firing its huge slug thrower at the MECHA, but due to his movement, the rounds were not so accurate, and most bounced off the shield or missed altogether. Colonel Nogel realized, that if the Brawler has been still, the AP rounds from the slug thrower would have been more accurate and would have burned out the force shield. It was a good thing the Brawler was not very adept with the slug thrower.

Colonel Nogel decided to let the Brawler enter into close combat. He wanted to utilize all weapon systems at all ranges to ensure their effectiveness. So he waited as the Brawler came within arms reach. He had his two forearm plasma blades ignited. As the Brawler closed in, it dropped the slug thrower and held the battle axe with two hands as it used one strong overhand strike to attempt to cleave the MECHA in two.

Seeing the axe coming down, Colonel Nogel used his left forearm blade to strike up at an angle to cut through the Brawler's right arm, while using the right forearm blade to cut across the creature's chest. The axe was not blocked enough as the force of the down strike hit and penetrated the right shoulder, thereby disabling the mobility of the right arm. Colone Nogel angled his left foream blade so it entered the flesh of the Brawler and he attempted to cut through and down to severe the arm.

The right forearm blade had also cut across the Brawler's huge chest, creating a sizzling swathe, causing some purplish ichor to ooze out of the wound. The Brawler reacted violently and shifted back, but not before its right arm was hanging limply at it side, with the axe still embedded in the MECHAs shoulder plating.

While the Brawler was in a weakened state, Colonel Nogel used this moment to press forward his attack with his left forearm blade, and cut across its throat. The Brawler was not able to react in time to stop the full thrust of the attack as the energy blade sliced open his muscular throat. The Brawler held its left hand to its throat in an attempt to block the flow of blood, but too late, as the arteries were severed and it fell over on its side, breathing ever slowly until its last breath.

MECHA XPM-02 was a success with moderate damage. Colonel Nogel was given a brand new MECHA of the same design with a command suite modification. He was promoted and given the title of Stremzaya (strem za ya) or Battlemaster. Battlemaster  Nogel would also call his MECHA the Battlemaster class.

In a few years he was able to organize the 1st MECHA Battalion, consisting of 125 djaigota (jei go ta), war machines, of various sizes and classes. Battlemaster Nogel wanted the MECHA pilots to have some status, so if they excelled, they were given the command of a MECHA company of 25 djaigota, and title of Artegneor (ar tag nee or) or Knight. Once in command of a MECHA battalion, they were given the distinct title of Stremzaya.

It was years later that Battlemaster Vankar Nogel was given the title of Dogotai (do go tie), or Lord, by vote from the Djoreli Charter of Lords for his endeavour in creating the MECHA organizarion, and upholding the honour and integrity becoming of a soldier, an officer, and a leader in the Djoreli Imperium.

THE BATTLEMASTER Part 2

While in the MECHA Research Division (MRD), Battle Capt Nogel became one of many test pilots. The Djoreli Imperium needed to create larger MECHA as they were receiving reports of the reptilian
Sazzarran collecting giant species of stinzoa (creatures) across their part of the galaxy. The Imperium needed something that could easily handle any of the giant creatures.

It took several years, and several prototypes. They tried with a two man crew in the head of the MECHA. The physical manipulation of the MECHA was extremely difficult with just one pilot, considering the MECHA was 60 metres tall. With two pilots they could manage it better. But the physical aspect required some skill and much effort that would physically drain the pilots after a day's work moving around in it.

It took many months of field testing, but eventually the Research teams were able to devise a mind link system that allowed one pilot to manipulate the MECHA. Although, it would still be a lot of effort to move the MECHA and engage in combat while commanding others. A two-person crew would allow one of them to be Commander and Gunner, while the other concentrated on piloting the MECHA. A three-person crew was best for a MECHA. One would Command, one would operate the weapons, and the third would pilot the MECHA, mainly just operating the legs.

However, the powers that be wanted to experiment with single pilot MECHA. So, the scientists eventually developed a mind link with just one pilot in an enclosed gel padded cockpit. The pilot would be in a light power armoured suit and attached to the MECHA through mind linking cables to his legs, arms and helmet. The pilot had better control over legs for movement and arms for using any weapons. However, it still took a lot of concentration and mental effort to maintain it for any period of time.

The official designation of the single pilot MECHA was Experimental Prototype MECHA (XPM)-01. It stood 60 metres tall, carried a plasma rifle in its right hand, two internal mounted torso missile launchers, and detachable leg missile launchers.

The first to pilot it was not Colonel Nogel. It was Battle Major Davvis Sewik-Rando. The two of them had become a good team since the MRD started. Vankar wanted his friend, Davvis, to have first shot at piloting the MECHA. The man had gone through a lot to get to this point in history, and Vankar was willing to let him have the honour and glory.

XPM-01 performed admirably in agility, reaction time, and targetry. However, it had to be tested in a near real firefight to determine if the pilot, and the MECHA could perform just as well under a more stressful situation. So, they transported the MECHA with the 39th PI Battalion (PIB) to the closest contested world, Orrim.

Orrim had a small colony of a few thousand people of mixed allied species. They had recently been taken over by an under strength battalion of Sazzarran soldiers. The Sazzarran apparently had a giant four legged, centaur-like creature with them. It was 40 metres tall, carried a massive double-bladed axe in its right hand, and had several long barbed tail whips that could easily catch anyone on the ground or as high as 20 metres into the air.

The "Brawler" class stinzo (creature).

Once the Djoreli space navy was able to eliminate any Sazzarran ships in orbit, they sent down their dropships and assaulted the Sazzarran garrison located outside the colony. While the 39th PIB took on any Sazzarran ground and air troops, XPM-01 headed straight for the centaur creature, later called the Brawler class by the Djoreli.

Battle Major Sewik-Rando fired a salvo of six missiles at the centaur as it charged towards his MECHA. Although the targeting system was working, four of the missiles appeared to either bounce off the centaur's hide, or miss altogether. The two that did hit, struck a front leg and the torso. The creature lost its balance for a moment. but due to its momentum still carried it closer to the MECHA.

XPM-01 fired the MECHA sized plasma rifle. The centaur suffered some burn damage from the shots as it closed in. The thing was massive, angry, and apparently determined to take the MECHA down. As it closed within melee range, XPM-01 placed the rifle against its back, using a magnetic clamp system, and ignited the energy blades from its two forearms as it adopted a defensive stance.

A second before the centaur slammed into the MECHA, the creature swung its massive axe in an overhead arc in an attempt to strike the head. Battle Major Sewik-Rando, seeing this, shifted his stance enough for the blade to screech off the field grey armour, cutting a deep groove into the MECHAs head and left shoulder.

XPM-01 used its right arm to jab upwards into the creature's torso, while using the left energy blade to block the axe arm and try to cut it off. The creature, seeing what the MECHA was trying to do, took a couple of steps back, then lifted its body up and used it front legs to kick at the torso of the MECHA. The impact knocked the MECHA off its feet and back 30 metres.

BM Sewik-Rando was stunned by the attack, and attempted to get back up as his internal systems were screaming for attention. He turned the alarms off, and found that the torso had been caved in enough to cause an open fracture. Another hit like that and the MECHA's engine could be compromised.

As XPM-01 got back up, the centaur did not pause as it immediately advanced on the MECHA, and proceeded to stamp down on it with its hooves. XPM-01 used its left hand to grab the front forward leg and cut at it with the right forearm blade. The energy from the blade cauterized the wound as it severed the limb. The creature fell back and to its right side, screaming in anger and pain. The centaur glared at the MECHA, and threw its axe dead center at the MECHAs torso. The blade embedded itself deep enough into the MECHA to severely damage the fusion powered core.

BM Sewik-Rando knew he did not have much time to escape the MECHA before it blew apart, so he moved the MECHA on top of the centaur creature and hit the emergency escape button. it did not work. In fact, most of the systems were going offline. Seconds later, as the centaur tried to get away from the MECHA, XPM-01 exploded, forming a small nuclear explosion, destroying everything within one kilometre of it, and causing severe damage to anything within another three kilometres of the blast.

The Battlemaster will conclude on Monday, December 11th.

THE BATTLEMASTER

Now I am going to start with the MECHA and kaiju. MECHA is capitalized in my game, because it is an acronym for Mobile Enhanced Combat Heavy Armour. The words for the acronym may change later, in final print, but that is it for now.

Each MECHA and kaiju will have its own background and some specifications. I will begin with the key player in the Kaiju Conquest universe. It is the Battlemaster Lord Vankar Nogel.

Battlemaster Nogel standing on the shoulder
of his Battlemaster class MECHA.
Art by Becca-TR.

Battlemaster Nogel is a Djoreli (jor el ee). The Djoreli have slightly golden hued skin and stand between 7.5 and 8 feet tall. They can live up to 200 Earth years if they live well (A Djoreli year is roughly equal to 1.5 Earth years). They are one of the earliest species to spread out to the stars in our galaxy nearly 5,000 years ago. Battlemaster Nogel was not born to a noble family. That will be explained later.

Like all youth in his species, Vankar joined the Army branch of the Djoreli Imperium at the age of 10. During the first three years in the military the Djoreli soldiers learn more about the military aspects of the Imperium. It's history, the various military branches and how they all support one another in battle. They also learn more about their allies and foes in the galaxy. Next, they receive unarmed combat and martial arts training.

By 12 Djoreli years of age, they begin weapons training with various slug throwing and energy pistols and rifles of the various warfaring species. This way, in combat, they can easily take an opponent's weapon and know how to use it right away, when their own weapon is out of ammo or damaged.

By 15 Djoreli years, they have already been posted to their respective military branches in the galaxy. Like any soldier in any military in the galaxy, Vankar Nogel started out at the Private rank. He was posted to a garrison on a world called Throwback. It was a backwater mining world. His unit was posted there to protect the mining facility as it provides valuable minerals in the production of armour plating for their vehicles and starships.

About 8 months into his tour on Throwback, Vankar's unit and the inhabitants at the local city were attacked by Gorakan Pirates. The Pirates wanted the minerals to make more of their own vehicles and starships. They are space scavengers. They will practically attack any species that has something of value to them.

During the battle, Vankar has to occupy an anti-air cannon, and was able to down several of the Gorakan shuttles and fighter craft before his gun emplacement was destroyed by one of the fighters. Vankar was injured from the attack, but he was able to continue the fight for as long as possible until proper medical aid could reach him. While injured, he and several of his fellow soldiers were  able to repulse a platoon of Gorakan Pirates from infiltrating the mining facility.

By the end of the third day of battle, the Gorakan Pirates managed to steal a few containers of the minerals before hightailing from Throwback, losing a lot of their members. But they always gain more their species. They breed like rabbits.

Due to his efforts in protecting the mining facility, Vankar was given the Purple Star, the lowest of the medals of honor, and promoted to Battle Squad Second-in-Command (2ic). Equal to an Earth Corporal.

In the ensuing years, like many other soldiers, Vankar rose through the ranks to Sergeant Major of a Battle Company before he was given the opportunity to go Officer. At the age of 30, Vankar was now a Lieutenant (Lt) and rising quickly in the Officer ranks. His first command as a junior officer was on the planet Horakon, where his unit, the 23rd Powered Infantry (PI) Battalion, and two other PI Battalions,  was to engage a Ja'Kel regiment that had occupied Horakan for their own, slaughtering thousands of civilians and enslaving thousands more. Lt Nogel led his platoon of 24 men and women soldiers into battle against the Ja'Kel. It was a rough fight in the Horakan city. The Ja'Kel were putting up stiff resistance, holding civilians as hostages and shields against the Djoreli advance.

Lt Nogel has lost at least 6 of his people before they were able to wormhole their way through the walls of the buildings. They did this by burning holes big enough for them to crawl through. They would throw whichever grenades they had available, be it stun, flash, blind, frag, HE or plasma. Although they tried to be careful when it came to the civilians, it became useless, as the Ja'Kel would often kill the civilian shields and just create supports for them to stand them up.

The battle at Horakan city lasted at least two weeks before the Ja'Kel were eliminated. Not one of them was allowed to leave the planet alive. The city was nearly destroyed, but the Djoreli have a contingency for situations like this. They called in their Construction Engineers to help the citizens of Horakan re-build their city.

Lt Nogel's remaining soldiers were given Purple Stars for their performance on Horakan, Vankar Nogel was given the Bronze Star. Over the next two years, Vankar became a Battle Captain in command of a Battle Company. He continued to impress his superiors that he was given the opportunity to join a new organization in the Djoreli Imperium. The MECHA Research Division.

Part Two on the Battlemaster will be posted on Sunday, December 10th,

BATTLE THROUGH THE PORTAL

Over the next few months I will be posting a lot of information about Kaiju Conquest. Most of that will be the different mecha, kaiju, bases and military units in the game. I am starting with the original imagery for my game. This was the second image my artist, Becca-TR, created for me. See image below.

The image shows the Battlemaster mecha and a Thunder Dragon kaiju engaged in close combat as they fall through the Portal near a beach on the island of Oahu, Hawaii. This was an early morning scene. The disturbance from the Portal caused high winds around it. You will see on bottom right a naval vessel and on the left of the portal an ocean oil rig. In the center around the Portal are two military helicopters sent to investigate the Portal with the naval vessel, when the mecha and kaiju fall through it.

In the background, on the other side of the Portal is the surface of Mars. The year is 2116, and Mars has a small, but ever growing, human colony, which is taken over when the alien reptilian species, the Sazzarran, decide to occupy Mars and setup short range Portals as a staging area for their invasion of Earth. The Portals are an experiment, as well as the kaiju, the giant monsters being used as frontline assault units and support for the military units. 

My original intent was to use this image for my game box cover. But over time there was too much going on with it, so I had it changed to something a little more subtle, as shown below.

Also, with Becca's artistic assistance, I was able to create the side panels for the game box as shown below.

I am still working on improving the back of the box, so eventually you will see that.

In the last month I have had a big change in the combat mechanic for my game, Kaiju Conquest. For the last 3.5 years the mechanic was the same. Any units from opposing sides in the zone must battle for control of the zone. I had a Battle Board designed so the units could be placed across from each other and it was easier for the players to designate which unit was attacking an opposing unit. In the last 3.5 years there were three version of the Battle Board as seen below.

BattleBoard Version 1

BattleBoard Version 2

BattleBoard Version 3 

The mechanic played out for the most part, and although it was thematic with sea attacking sea, land attacking land, air attacking air, etc, but it bogged down game play, especially if there were several zones to battle over.

It was about a month after I had sent the latest version of my game to the six playtesters and their groups, that I had an epiphany about how I can quicken the combat phase. However, I would have to sacrifice the theme a bit. It was worth the risk. I just wish I had thought of it sooner.

The game has been played with the new system and it does work better with less time spent who is attacking whom.  There is also no longer a Battle Board to use. There will be a video coming soon on all the phases in the game, but I will say that the mechanic involves both sides rolling all their attack dice at the same time, the players take out the misses, use Command Points for re-rolls and then total the number of hits they made, The opposing player then gets to decide which of his or her units are eliminated.

There had to be some changes in the cards for this new mechanic to work better. I had to reduce the number of abilities of each mecha and kaiju to just one each for the healthy and damaged sides. I also had to modify their statistics, such as Attack value, Defense value and Hit points to accommodate the new system. Then I had to make a modification to the Resource cards for the mecha and kaiju as to healing and repairing other mecha, kaiju and bases.

The latest cards ready to be cut and pasted together.

I think the game will flow a little smoother now, but time will tell, and I hope my playtesters will tell also the good and the bad. Now for some cutting and pasting while I listen to some inspirational soundtracks.

KC Prototype Game Packing

The video below represents the latest in the game product. There are still some amendments to be made to it. Note that there will be ziploc baggies for all the components with exception of the rulebook, reference sheets and game board.

KAIJU CONQUEST PROTOTYPE

It has been over a year since my last post here. In that time, I have been highly motivated to get the game to Kickstarter, and at other times I have been in a slump. In the last few months, I have been re-motivated. In that time, I have managed to get 6 prototypes printed through Print and Play Productions. This post will be my point of view on using a print and play company. 

Three months ago, in July, I was able to complete my latest revision of the game rules. At least 30 revisions have been done since I started designing this game in January 2014. I needed to get some prototypes out to blind playtesters, because until this time, I had only explained the rules to people. For those who may not be aware, a blind playtester is one who is required to read the rules and play the game without influence from the game designer. 

It took this long to get several prototypes done because of the funds required. There were three print and play companies I looked at, and in the end, only one of them I had dealt with before and I felt had the right templates to print my game. That company was Print and Play Productions. It took me a month to get all the templates done to their specifications and to make corrections through emails. Of course, if I had just stuck to the basics for printing, it would have probably taken half the time, but I had a couple of special orders I wanted for my game, that took longer than expected, and cost me a few more dollars. One of those orders was the game box insert, which had to be designed so there was enough space in the middle and sides to fit all the components and minis. The other special order was a token holder box that would contain the unit tokens for both factions in the game. 

Once all the templates were uploaded (and there were quite a number of them as it does have a lot of components),  and paid for, it took three weeks to get them in the mail. I had the company mail out the games to each of the playtesters with three of the games going to me, as I would have one for myself and the other two playtesters lived in the my local area so I could hand deliver the games to them.

So here is the latest prototype box.