Planes and Mercs: Difference between revisions

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''Nathan "Bowman" Webber demonstrating how all warcrimes begin.'' }}

 

 

Originally began in early 2010, when the man soon known as ''op-again'' asked [[Image Board]] /tg/ for some fighter plane advice for a homebrew air combat RPG his GM was running. Within 2 months, he had posted several briefings and after-action reports from his games, and earned himself and his fellow players much respect from other fligh/tg/uys, and is likely responsible for a number of similar games being designed and re-designed, including an Area 88 version and Firestorm (detailed below)

 

Planes and Mercs is the title bestowed by members of /tg/ since GM [[Magnificent Bastard]] Steve has yet to print up his own rule set. Originally set in Africa, with operations mostly taking place in Liberia, it then expanded to covert ops in Georgia, and some [[Crazy Awesome]] shenanigans with the [[French Foreign Legion]].

* [[Car Fu]] - Or at least, it would have been if the truck-bomb plan had come through...

* [[Fighter Launching Sequence]] - Happened once before a British airstrike on their operating base. More often than not, though, it's the enemy who need to launch... Then it happened again, with Djibouti airport being raided by Iran.

* [[A Nuclear Error]] - During Operation Babylon it seems that regular laser guided "bunker buster" bombs had been swapped out for low yield nuclear weapons. As to who did this, it is unknown. One was dropped, another came back and was turned in as "evidence" (most likely to disappear) and another somewhere at the bottom of the Strait of Hormuz.

* [[Anyone Can Die]] - In the very first mission two pilots died; Canadian Ross "Suit" Cameron , flight lead for the Musketeers, was killed when a Mig 21 blew apart his Falcon with 23mm cannon fire over the Red Sea. Fellow American Musketeer Henry "Guv" Dravot was seriously wounded when he crashed his damaged F-5 Tiger II into the runway. Patrick "Creek" Dawson of Swart Katte flight was injured while attempting a gun run on an armoured convoy. He managed to make it back to base but crashed on the surface and ejected straight into the asphalt.

* [[Badass Boast]] - During the combined Swarte Katte/Aquila operation on a fortified Iranian island (Code name "Babylon"). Jamail "Fossil" Al Baghdadi doesn't even attempt stealth. As soon as he enters the operational airspace he says this over an open radio frequency "Attention all Islamic Republic of Iran forces. This is Captain Jamail al-Baghdadi of the Iraqi Air Force's 27th Strategic Bombardment Wing. By the order of President Saddam Hussein, Welcome! to the worst day of your lives." Please note that the campaign takes place in 2015, not 1985.

* [[Badass Israeli]] - David "Uno" Peled of Griffon flight, an Israeli of Ethiopian descent who assassinates militant leaders and doesn't afraid of anything.

* [[Bar Brawl]] - Sophie "Kermit" Duprac insitagetes this on her first day on the job by smashing a beer bottle all over Julienne "Witch" Nikarova's face.

* [[Berserk Button]] - Never talk about Iran with Jamail. Ever. Also, never mention the relationship between France and Quebec to Sophie unless you like beer and blood all over your face.

* [[Break Out the Museum Piece]] - The most advanced fighter in any player's arsenal is the F-16C. Most pilots can only afford Vietnam era jets such as the F-4 Phantoms, Mig 21s and Mirage IIIs.

* [[Brooklyn Rage]] - Nicholas "Crutches" Delorezia is from New Jersey (close enough). It's somewhat subverted in that his childhood was pretty normal (no running with gangs or anything)but somewhat played straight in that he flies off the handle with a stream of Jersey accented verbal abuse. Also, he spent five years in third world shitholes with the French Foreign Legion.

* [[Captain Smooth and Sergeant Rough]] - Swarte Kattes' two [[X Os]] are the mild mannered USAF veteran Paul "Caddy" Vosser and the foul mouthed ex-RAF veteran McLeach who can't make it through a sentence without swearing or an hour without a drink.

* [[Code Name]] - Played very straight. In real life, your flight mates assign you a call sign that is intended to be funny and you have no say in the matter. Musketeer's Nicholas "Crutches" Delorezia got his name because of a constant limp that resulted from a tour with the French Foreign Legion. Another Musketeer, Henry "Guv" Dravot received his name for knocking up the Texas Governor's daughter. Jamail "Fossil" Al Baghdadi's call sign is simple; he's nearly 50 years old during the Firestorm timeline and seen combat in the Iran-Iraq War!

* [[Dwindling Party]] - Averted. While Anyone Can Die is in effect, losses are always replaced.

* [[Eagle Squadron]] - Averted. None of the mercs give two shits about how Yemen's future turns out, they just want that new plane already.

* [[Elite Mooks]] - The Swart Kattes were the first flight to encounter something other than ageing Soviet equipment, in the form of a pair of F-14s. Sophie "Kermit" Duprac, flying a Mig-21bis didn't give a fuck and shot both of them down.

* [[Everyone Calls Him "Barkeep"]] - The local bartender is simply known as "Heyu" (Hey You!). His actual name is Julian Debere but it's only mentioned once in passing.

* [[Fighter Launching Sequence]] - Semi-Averted. Missions always start with the pilots just entering the operational airspace, unless they're rallying to defend the airport.

* [[Follow the Leader]] - Steve's game was the progenitor and origination of the concept in action. Firestorm and other assorted Planes and Mercs games are technically the spin-offs. All of them are entertaining.

* [[General Ripper]] - The Iran-Iraq War left Jamail "Fossil" Al Baghdadi with an extreme aversion of Iranians. He never misses an excuse to launch an attack on them and would love nothing more than Iran-Iraq War Part Two.

* [[Gunship Rescue]] - The Musketeers manage to save a reccondo unit that happened to crash land in their operational airspace with a helpful bomb and gun strike.

* [[Guy in Back]] - Of the PC pilots, Aquila flight's Walter Johannes is this to Haakon "Hammer" Gustavson. Jack "Grizzly" Gruesser also has an NPC RIO by the name of "Vamp". Another flight carries six pilots in four planes, rotating pilots around for piloting the 1 seaters and taking turns flying or [[GI Bing]] the 2 seaters.

* [[I Call It Vera]] - Stewart "Bonnie" Connolly of Swarte Katte flight loves his [[J 35 J]] Draken a little too much. He hasn't named it yet but talks to it as though it were a woman, explaining why he didn't simply eject when the plane was written off mid-flight by a Iranian [[Mi G]]. McCleach loved his destroyed Tornado but in a father-son sort of way rather than romantically.

* [[If You Kill Him You Will Be Just Like Him]] - Subverted. Jamail doesn't seem to mind the deaths of the enemy pilots because they're Iranian and in his mind, all of them deserve to die.

* [[I See Dead People]] - Arguably Jamail. He seems to go in and out of hallucinations varying from seeing family members to outright talking to the ghosts of [[It's All My Fault|People he believes he's directly responsible for the death of.]]

* [[Large Ham]] - McCleach.

* [[Legion of Lost Souls]] - All the pilots in the game are a foreign legion working for the Yemeni government. Many of them are running from dark pasts while others are in it for the money or excitement of air to air combat.

* [[Military Maverick]] - Sophie "Kermit" Duprac of Swart Katte flight, regularley disobeying orders and regularly notching up air to air kills against superior aircraft. Also, broke a bottle over a French pilot's head on her first day on the job. Witch seems to hold a grudge.

* [[Mission Briefing]] - All flights are briefed by their NPC commanding officers before every mission.

* [[Missile Lock On]] - With missiles being the main armament of most fighters, hearing a good tone before firing a missile is a must.

* [[Multinational Team]] - Currently there are 14 nationalities spread across 27 pilots. The most awkward is Griffon flight; They have a Pakistani flight lead, an Israeli number two, a German, a Japanese, a Chinese American and a Saudi all in the same flight.

* [[New Meat]] - Common due to new players joining the game as well as players rolling new characters to replace lost ones.

* [[Nice Guy]] - Resident Iraqi Jamail "Fossil" al-Baghdadi shows a nicer side to Henry "Guv" Dravot while he is recuperating from crash injuries sustained on his first mission. Also delivers a copy of Saddam Hussein's allegorical "Zabibah and the King" to "Guv" for reading material.

* Nom De Guerre - Sophie Duprac proved so capable on her first flight that her old callsign "Kermit" just wasn't good enough, and is now (and forevermore) referred to as "Warfrog."

* [[Parental Abandonment]] - An important part of Sabine "Hamlet" Eichler's backstory.

* [[Private Military Contractors]] - There are several PMCs in the game contracting work and all the flights belong to PMCs of varying legitimacy.

* [[Rare Vehicles]] - Stewart "Bonnie" Connolly flew a [[J 35 J]] Draken. The Musketeers were also gifted a vintage CF-101B Voodoo. Also, considering how the US military is scrapping the F-14 Tomcat to prevent Iran for getting spare parts, Swart Katte's F-14A Tomcat can also be considered rare in the context of the game world.

* [[Shoot Everything That Moves]]- Averted. Civilian airliners, civilians on the ground and friendly ground forces all keep you on your toes. Most obviously demonstrated when the Musketeers shot at a suspicious large aircraft that turned out to be a Saudi Airlines flight carrying royalty.

* [[Sudden Principled Stand]] - Musketeers, Specifically Nicholas, during the most recent mission - Finally fed up with being implicit in wetwork and messy, quasi-legal business, he opened fire on an incoming friendly to save another group of (NPC) Mercs they'd been tasked to defend.

* [[The Determinator]] - Fossil and the Coke Bottle Express, a second-hand X-6/Tu-16 bomber. First operation resulted in one engine destroyed, the co-pilot and tail gunner killed, the wings on fire, and he still managed to get bombs on target and return 'safely'.

* [[The Mafiya]] - No one knows where the two Russian PMCs, Red Star Solutions and OKB-276, get their money from.

* [[We Have Reserves]] - The Iranian mentality during Operation Granite Harvest.

* [[We ARE Struggling Together!]] - The different player squadrons have cordial relations and will help each other, but by no means are the "On the same side". Notable exclusions can be Aquila and Griffin squadrons (as they both work for Advantage Flight Solutions) and Swart Katte and Musketeers who (Witch and Warfrog not withstanding) have struck up a sort of friendship.

* [[World War III]] - It's what the players are participating in. Except not a huge nuclear war, rather dozens of small brushfire wars fought by PMCs that are secretly funded by national governments. A Cold War 2.0 if you will.

* [[Kleptomaniac Hero]] - If its not bolted down/signed for Swart Katte has stolen it and claimed ownership. "Borrow forever©" is a common term.

 

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[[Category:Roleplay]]