I looked at this mercenary who wanted to meet with me. I had no idea what mercenary leader meant, was he the one in charge or was he, like, some regular dude?
Who knew right?
Well, I'm assuming that Christine (hey! I remembered her name!) would know.
Still, it would be impolite to elbow her and ask 'who is this guy?' right?
I mean, I'm happy enough that he wants my help, like, seriously. That's a big push for my self confidence there.
I'm building stuff, but to have some killer of men, a real badass ask me for help?
That's real big stuff right there.
"So, what do you need the help of the Utility Corporation for?" I ask, looking at him and raising my eyebrow.
They did that in movies back in my 1st life.
I always wanted to do the same! Haha.
"Well, the answer to that one is quite simple Mister Vu. I'm in the business of killing people and protecting the people of Tetersen. Doing both at the same time is what I'm good at." He said.
Woah.
That was pretty cool, I'm not going to lie.
Not to myself.
"Okay, that's cool. But what do you need me for exactly?" I ask him, it's not like I designed anything military-like.
Well, not anything immediately military like. They could adapt the various things that I had around the place into something military-like if they wanted, but, nothing came off my production lines with a gun strapped to them.
That was all aftermarket.
If I sold the guns separately with easy attach instructions, well, at least they weren't coming out the door militarised.
"Right now I need some help getting vehicles that can help me with identifying a doctrine that we can use against the Combine." He said to me.
I lean back on the chair.
Well now, that was something.
"I'm not sure what I can do, let's be honest here, I'm just a regular guy. There's nothing special about me right? I can help you build stuff, but if you want me to actually design something I need some more information, or at least a design that is already completed." I reply to him, leaning back in my chair.
I could design stuff to be sure, but how was I to know what the stuff I designed would be used for?
I needed specifications before I tried doing something. Otherwise I would be like those designers in my previous life, the ones that designed something absolutely useless first and then tried to find a buyer later.
Worse, I wasn't anywhere near important enough for a government contract to be landed on my lap to 'maintain a strategic industry' or whatever they wanted to call it.
"Well, we can make a list I'm sure. I need a better logistical train from the jumpships to the dropships. I need fast and self contained fighting vehicles. I need vehicles with enough ooomph in them to lay down the hate while being armoured enough to survive contact with the enemy. There's a lot to be honest. What would you like to focus on?" He asked me at the end of that spiel.
Which, well, was a lot.
I could do that, like, no problem. I could do that.
But I couldn't do all that at once, especially not with the kind of throughput needed to actually be worthwhile. After all, from the combat command creation table, it would cost me double the RP needed to create a regiment to also attach jumpships to it.
So questionably loyal, and green experience Medium Battlemech Regiment would be 24 RP, 48 with jumpships.
I was producing, right now, 21 RP.
I would need to then also fund its movement costs, supply costs, and everything else.
It was simply too much to be worthwhile right now.
No, I couldn't do the jumpships or creating combat commands right now.
Actually, did he ask about my creating a combat command or just building vehicles for him?
"Keep it focused to one vehicle type of smaller scale please. I can't do jumpships or dropships right now. You are also crewing them right? I don't need to do anything?" I ask, making sure to not repeat the lessons of my previous lesson where I had forgotten to clarify.
"Haha! Yes, I'll be crewing them. I just need the vehicles from you Mister Vu." He grinned at me as I squinted my eyes at him. Well then, if didn't need to crew them, I could do that easily enough.
"Okay then, what do you need."
"Right now, I need those 20 Ton Utility trucks of yours Mister Vu. I need the weaponry for them and I'm going to be using them to practice with my men the process of killing the Combined soldiery in the most efficient manner possible." He said to me as I nod my head.
"And if that works out the way we want it to, then I am going to want to see what other vehicles you can produce in your magic shop of wonders." He said to me as I nod my head again.
Well, I can do that, there's no reason I couldn't right?
+Break+
Colonel Speddforth glanced at the price list in front of him.
En-route to the front, he had been made aware of this little diversion on Tetersen, a new factory that was producing civilian machines (that could easily be made military capable).
He had figured why not, why not purchase something and see what his engineers and techs could make of them.
He would be the first one to do so and thus, the life of the party.
A grin crossed his lips, no matter how road worthy these things were, he was going to be the first.
At least, that had been his thought before seeing the machines in qustion.
The Utes were… a bedrock of creative ideas, that much was for certain.
The wide and long bed at the back of the machine.
The three seat row cabin at the front.
The lack of any frills on the design.
Sure it lacked almost any armour, but that could be solved with some weapons on the back couldn't it?
"Say, why can't you deliver these with some weapons already installed my good man? It would make it so much easier to sell these to my friends in the Skye Rangers." He said to the soon to be ennobled Huu Vu. It wasn't like the Archon would allow someone who created a new vehicle factory from scratch to remain a commoner.
"That would require changing the factory output. Can't do that. It's like changing a baby after its born by adding a new leg or something. Completely wrong." Was the reply, the man's face changing into one of disgust.
Speddforth glanced at the man and hid a grin.
Well, he wouldn't be the most unusual of industrialists, that much was certain. The idea of toying with his creation, despite it being for the better being completely revulsion inducing to the man was, well, he could respect that.
"Well then, consider me a convert Mister Vu. I'll take as may as can fit in my Union." Speddforth concluded, thinking that he could mount a missile system of some kind on the back and, well, that was going to put the foxes into the hens wouldn't it?
Just thinking of the literal circles he was going to run around Colonel Almsberry was, mwah, delicious.
He turned his eyes to the mercenary commander that was occupying the statuesque flame-haired beauty that ran the actual money in this place.
The way that they were standing spoke of long familiarity. Of the familial kind.
Something there to keep an eye on he thought, perhaps a long lead to the mercenary, some chatter, and, well, Speddforth would be the first one in the loop regarding any new products.
Wouldn't that just be grand?
+Break+
"This Huu Vu is easy enough to talk to isn't he?" Alexander said to Christine after the aforementioned party had left the room. Leaving Christine and himself to talk contracts, something the young owner hadn't wanted any part in.
"He is. I'm not going to let you take advantage of him." Christine said, her eyes narrowed at him.
Alexander had to stifle a chuckle.
"Not going to take the side of family over this one?" He asked with a wide grin.
"His side is the family's side." Her reply was defiant.
"A side he doesn't even know about yet?" His teasing reply had her narrowing her eyes even further. Looking like the slits in a helmet's visor really, ready to cause some hurt to him if he kept this up.
But, well, if he wasn't ready for some bleeding, he wouldn't be leading a mercenary company would he?
"His designs will pull the family out of the rut that we have been. We need him." She said this with a straight face even.
Part of the expansionist faction was she?
The ones that wanted the family to take a more open hand in the Inner Sphere to prepare them against the inevitable coming of the Clans in the Pentagon worlds.
But it was more than that wasn't it?
"This is more than the family isn't it?" He asked, his grin going wider yet still. It was starting to hurt, his cheeks trembling with how wide he was stretching them.
"He's innocent. Focused even. He's not the kind of person that should be brought into the rest of the world." She proclaimed. "He's doing what he can to help everyone he can, even you." She accused.
"I'm trying to help people too you know. The more dead Dracs there are, the less dead and enslaved Lyrans there are. And, well, the more the SLDF will be avenged."
She glared.
"Well then, we can deal with your repressed feelings for innocent and gullible young men later. Let's talk purchases hmmmm?"
Her hand twitched violently.
+Break+
I hum as I look at the production line.
One more month and the 20 Ton Utility Truck line would be complete.
It had left me with 5 RP to… do something with.
So I spent it on increased production of weapons systems.
AC/5s, PPCs, Lasers of all types.
Enough weapons so that potential customers would have everything and anything they needed.
After all, with the truck, the fact that it had 7 tons of armour and a 5.5 ton cargo bay meant that I could mount any energy system, any missile system, everything ballistic except the AC/20, but unfortunately none of the artillery systems.
It could even be mounted with any of the industrial pieces of equipment available to me, from bridge layers to bulldozers.
A general 'do it all' vehicle this truck.
So I was spending my time building up the equipment production lines to fill in literally any gaps that a potential customer would have.
The calls were getting easier now.
I still had no idea how they worked really, like, why does comparing someone to another person suddenly make them want to assist?
Why does saying that they were the best autocannon manufacturers in the inner sphere allow me to make their autocannon?
Why does saying that I could rebuild their weapons that they couldn't anymore due to the Succession Wars allow me to use their blueprints so long as I had their name inscribed on the weapons?
Seriously, people made no sense.
Why were people so weird about stuff?
Hmmmm.
After this, what was I going to do next?
I had a truck… hmmm… I should double the production line.
That would leave… dammit, I needed a calculator.
I had 24 RP per turn from the 2 Ute factories.
12 RP from the 20 Ton Utility Truck factory.
36 per turn. With the Lyran Bonus of 30% that sent it to 46.8 RP or 47 RP per turn.
Hmmmm.
Building another truck factory would give me 35 RP to work with.
Fuck.
I should… build more factories?
Yes.
I should do that.
Ah, I was coming to the problem that I had too much RP.
Ah? Fortifications were expensive?
Transport?
Supply?
Right right, this wasn't just a game about spending RP to build things.
I was meant to be out there conquering stuff.
(Un)fortunately I was not in a position to command anyone to do anything, so I didn't have to do any of the conquering stuff. Or the command of men stuff. Or anything that would put me in a position of authority.
I was here thank you very much.
So, factory expansion it was while I tried to figure out what to do with all of this.
+Break+
Excerpt from; To Supply an Army in the 31st Century, Doctor Andrew Lichens-field, University of Tharkad Press
The fundamentals of warfare have not changed since they were first etched down into words on clay bricks and fired in kilns by our ancestors millennia ago.
Leadership.
Morale.
Supply.
These are the three fundamentals of any fighting force.
That complexities however have increased since that time. Where before an army would forage on the march, and indeed, as during the Conquest of Britain by William the Bastard, the march that he understood was frought with danger and his men fell ill and weak. If Godwin had waited a week to fight him, the outcome of the contest would have been different indeed.
As a result, William commissioned the Domesday book, a book detailing every household in the nation, not just for taxation purposes, but to also have a map detailing the most efficient pillaging route possible to keep his armies supplied.
Never again would his army go into battle and starve due to lack of 'forage' i.e. food stolen from farms that made up the majority of the land use and occupations of that time period.
This did not change even during the age of Napoleon, widely recognised as one of the greatest military leaders of all time.
It was during the age of the train that everything fundamentally changed.
Rolling stock could move men and materiel at such speed and ferocity that any nation possessing a firm train network was considered impenetrable by another. Defenders could be rushed to the front faster than an enemy slowly marching under the rules laid out in the age of the Spartans could reach them.
Where an invasion would begin with a few thousand men slowly walking forward, the defenders could roll in 10,000 defenders a day.
Unfortunately, when off the train lines, the tyranny of the pack animal still reigned supreme. Away from the rolling stock they had to walk and march again as their forefathers under Xenophon had.
The advent of vehicle transport changed that.
Now it was fuel, a fossil fuel at that which governed the movement of an army. A truck carrying 2-3 tons of fuel could move thousands of kilometres without needing to stop. Wars became a battle of movement as these highly mobile forces darted about the battlefield.
Yet, everything was still focused on the ground with vehicles requiring contact with land and working along their lines of communication to be safe. Should an enemy sit astride these lines they would effectively cut off and starve any army down that line. Armies of the industrial era were hungry beasts, requiring 100 tons of food a day to maintain their men. Without this steady supply they would collapse in a matter of days.
It is not until General William Slim advocated for air resupply to handle the difficulties of maintaining a line of communication in the Jungle. Entire divisions were resupplied by air, breaking away from the need to maintain an army by land and unworried about encirclements. The men could effectively circle the wagons as it were and hold out until their own enemy, the Japanese, still constrained by the need to maintain a line of communication withered on the vine and starved to death.
This would remain fundamentally unchanged until the era of the starship.
Now there was another level of complexity to the question, and yet, paradoxically it remained as it had since those days of 1944.
If a force had sufficient dropship and jumpship support, they could maintain a line of communication to the front with relative ease. As it was during the age of the Star League. Entire armies supplied by the might of entire navies.
The Succession Wars brought this to ruin as it did to much.
Armies have reverted back to the age of Moltke.
Armies are brought forth onto the field of battle via technologies that none of them understand, deposited on the battlefield and then must march on foot and forage for their food from unwilling providers. Their supporting lines of communication only being able to provide them with the most vital of supplies for a few weeks at the very most.
Thus, there have been a lack of true military campaigns across the Inner Sphere since the days of the SLDF. How can there be when there is a simple lack of logistical capacity to supply these soldiers in a fight?
Regimental conflicts are now how wars are fought with three battalions being the norm.
This number has only reduced further with the continued destruction of the Inner Sphere's manufacturing infrastructure.
In the year of 2990 an inflection point has been reached however. In time, there is no doubt that a new round of manufacturing will arise, jumpships will be produced again, and a new age of warfare begin as logistical supply chains once again reach their full potential.
+Break+
Total RP Turn 7 2991 + 10 Months
16 RP 8×2 Ute Factory
Lyran Bonus = 1 + 0.3
Total RP = 16×1.3 = 20.8